


Over the Rainbow

by forlornopes



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: AU, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Family Issues, Gen, Minor Character Death, References to Illness, Smallville inspired, idk how to tag, playing fast and loose with canon though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-14
Updated: 2017-11-16
Packaged: 2018-08-30 21:33:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 45,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8549902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forlornopes/pseuds/forlornopes
Summary: Around a third of a century ago, in the midst of a meteor shower, a spaceship crash-landed on Earth. It plunged straight into the Missouri River and the small humanoid creature strapped inside eventually drowned. Years later, a similar spacecraft arrived on the planet. This time, the pod was reached before any harm could come to its inhabitant. The being inside was taken in and raised as the daughter of an Earth family who made certain that the special young woman never wanted for anything. At least, not until Kara Luthor got stuck in Smallville for a week.





	1. Chapter 1

Lex had not lied. Smallville was as backwards as one would imagine a town in the most poverty-stricken county in the state to be. The people stared at her car as she squealed past the city limit sign and into town off the bypass, sporting black shiny curves, tinted windows and an engine louder than their fireworks show on the Fourth of July. Kara noticed a mini mall to the right with elderly people milling about the parking lot, staggering from greasy spoon restaurant to Old Navy to medical supply store and back again. Lively.

 

Main Street was littered with young, haggard-looking mothers with their overactive children and yet more old people passing what time they had remaining with pacing the sidewalks in front of the half-abandoned storefronts all the way through town. Only a few buildings were home to more than one story, and those that were had old, rusty air conditioners hanging precariously out of the upper windows. And it was very quiet, though not unnervingly so… more like an old Western film set. Or a city in miniature. With the sparse and slow moving traffic and long, broad view of the horizon, Smallville wasn’t just sleepy - it was almost dreamlike. She could be in the 1950’s right now and wouldn’t have any idea of what point the break between her era and whatever time Smallville was preserved in had occurred.

 

Kara checked her GPS again to make sure she was heading towards the correct exit out of town. There was truly only one main road that lead all of the way through, but the surrounding area was lousy with ancient, gravel side roads, one of which she would be forced to utilize to reach the Kent Farm. Mom had recommended taking a rental with little elaboration, though the story was now notorious in the family. The last time Lillian Luthor had visited Smallville to have conversations with local leaders about the LuthorCorp wind turbine project, her vehicle had hit an armadillo and she had swerved into a ditch to avoid the rest of the family. Her accident had netted her a week’s stay in Smallville while the replacement parts were in transit. When she returned home in flannel, a few pounds heavier and with a sunburn from her forehead to her shoulders, the family had quickly learned not to press about her experience and mom never talked about how it went; not even over drinks. Creating her own infamous Smallville horror story wasn’t on Kara’s itinerary for this trip, so she paid as close attention to the road as she could without activating her enhanced vision.

 

LuthorCorp was nothing if not a family company, and being part of the family meant being at the company’s disposal, which was why Kara had been tasked with negotiating with the Kents over their land this time. They were the final holdout in this region, stubbornly blocking the LuthorCorp clean energy in Kansas initiative (known as “LCEK” to the wildly enthusiastic city planner), which was designed to garner Lex support before his to-be-announced race for President of the United States. That was a cynical way to look at it, because the wind farm really would benefit the local farmers and populace a great deal, but she wasn’t naive. Lex may have been the one to request that she handle this personally, but Lillian’s fingerprints were all over the play. Not that mom would stoop to entertain the thought that everything she did wasn’t solely for the good of her children and not their at times ill-fitting and overbearing roles as the Luthor legacies.

 

The GPS informed her that she would need to turn onto one of these gritty, dusty trails of a road in a mile, and Kara leaned back in her seat and popped her neck. She’d been driving for half a day, having left Metropolis before dawn, and that needling urge to make facile use of her abilities to streamline her responsibilities was in full effect out here in the Heartland. Blame it on the clear blue skies, bright warm sunlight and the chickenhawks circling overhead with an ease and freedom that Kara longed for. Smallville would have been a nice place to grow up if it weren’t for the rednecks, meth popularity and lack of a Starbucks. Out here on the open road, surrounded by green and tan rolling fields lined with the occasional signal tower to remind you that other people existed, the world seemed gentle and limitless, a sharp contrast to the confines of Metropolis with its endless abundance of cold steel walls and cutthroats with briefcases eager to destroy her life if she made a single slip in front of them. 

 

Her father had warned her that the Kents were tough customers for provincial folk and since there were only two women on the farm, she may need to appeal to their sense of sisterhood to convince them to sign on the dotted line. Which had made her cringe inside, but it was just like dad to see loyalty based on common strife as a nebulous tool designed to manipulate and control. Lionel had dragged her along to more meetings with female corporate leaders than she could count to give him an edge in appealing to their “progressive” business philosophies. Oh, the skill the man had for knowing just the right kind of flattery to impart in front of the right sort of people. Sometimes she nearly believed him.

 

Alex called it “selective memory” and said that a lot of human men were afflicted with it, though her father’s flare ups were the worst after praising his children in public and promptly forgetting when he’d lost his audience. Her mother was better about it - she’d remember the nice things she’d said about you exactly when she wanted something from you. So there was some merit to her best friend’s diagnoses of the Luthor parents  - though Kara tended to agree more with Alex’s girlfriend Maggie, who simply declared that most people were assholes by default and to what degree was defined by how many assholes around them allowed them to express it.

 

Turning left onto a bumpy path marked with a faded roadsign, Kara glanced at her phone, the flickering green light indicating that Alex had texted her back since her last stop at an A&W burger joint several hours back. She’d claimed that this vacation would be good for Kara, even though it was technically a business outing. To be honest, she didn’t know what kind of person she would be if she didn’t have Alex Danvers in her life. The inadvertently kindest thing her adoptive parents had ever done for her was track down the Danvers scientists to aid her in understanding her abilities. Sure, it was nice to learn why she sometimes woke up floating against her bedroom ceiling, but befriending their daughter over the years had probably saved her sanity while trying to cope with having heat vision and the crushing pressure of being a Luthor heir at the same time. 

 

She hadn’t had the chance to see Alex before she’d left for Smallville, as Dr. Danvers had been swamped with two consecutive shifts at NatCity General due to a significant portion of the other MDs being away at a convention. Alex had been the one to suggest that Kara road trip here just to have an excuse to get away from the stress of Lex’s impending campaign, her mother’s pointed prodding about her own future and her father’s well-meaning indifference to any and all of her hints at dissatisfaction with her life. She definitely owed Alex a feast and a girl’s night when she got back to civilization. The view, if nothing else, was worth the trip. Even Krypton hadn’t held this kind of beauty.

 

After another forty-five minutes of being jerked around on the uneven highway, blanketing her vehicle with grime and dust and seeing a spider the size of her foot shoot across the road in front of her, Kara finally caught sight of a structure a mile or so away; a large yellow farmhouse and accompanying red barn, silo, and other agricultural buildings and implements on the property. A wooden sign hanging over the driveway proclaimed it to be the “Kent Farm.” Dark clouds had begun to congregate overhead the farther she’d gotten from the city limit and from the looks of the sky, at least some of the dirt would be washed off her car by morning. Hopefully she could accomplish something before then, but the hulking piece of machinery blocking the road ahead of her didn’t bode well.

 

It reminded her of a green insect from the Flame Forest of Krypton, spiny with dozens of little legs but slightly larger and with wheels. As she drove up on it, something moved just to the right of the farm equipment, and through the dust from the road kicking up around her vehicle, she recognized it as a person. The womanly figure was slim and pale with long dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, and had her hand over her eyes, clearly trying to discern what exactly had been barrelling up the road towards her. Kara slowed to a stop before the woman, who dropped her arm and pinned the windshield with a stare as if she could see right through it, and Kara as well.

 

The stranger waved her off when she began to exit her vehicle, and shouted, “You may as well turn back around and head home.” She was dressed in a grease-stained button down shirt and jean shorts, her hands and cheek also painted with oil as evidence that she had been making some kind of repair on the looming hunk of metal.

 

“Uh, I’m just on my way through. Trying to reach the Kent residence. If you need help getting this towed-”

 

“I know who you are.” The woman met her eyes and the intensity of her gaze stopped Kara in her tracks. “And I don’t need  _ anything _ from you.”

Oh, wonderful. The locals were just as friendly as their town was drug-free. “Excuse me, but unless you’re law enforcement, you don’t have the right to bar people travelling like this.” Kara slammed her door closed and stepped closer to the rather dour-faced farmhand. “And if you think that I’d let a little inhospitality stop me from getting through here, then you have  _ no idea _ who I am.” 

 

“Hmmph.” Her brows drew together as she inspected Kara more closely, but the woman didn’t respond for a few seconds. Kara noticed her eyes widened just a bit, then instantly narrowed into a wary suspicion. “Well, I suppose I wouldn’t want to anger someone who rubs shoulders with people who have access to nuclear missile codes.” Begrudgingly, she held out one oil-splashed hand to Kara when she approached.

 

Kara took it and shook it firmly, refusing to back down from the unspoken challenge of getting her hands dirty. “And you are?”

  
“Lena Kent, Ms. Luthor. I imagine you’re here to try and sweet talk me into selling my soul?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First fic in this fandom, inspired by Smallville but expect some curveballs. Already had to fix the timeline in the summary; a promising beginning.


	2. Chapter 2

It had begun to sprinkle by the time Lena managed to finish repairing her “combine harvester.” Kara awkwardly stood over her handing her whatever tool she needed at her own insistence, though Lena had been clear she didn’t require the help. Kara loathed herself a little for the spark of hope in the back of her mind that coming to Lena’s aid could chip away some ice in their negotiations. She drove carefully behind her, leaving generous space between vehicles in case the massive machine decided to shed any parts on the way home. Checking her hair in the rearview mirror, she could see that her smart and professional bun had already been compromised by the drive and then the light shower, and she pulled it down, frustrated. Her blouse and pencil skirt were wrinkled and dingy - for a Luthor, her first impression left something to be desired. But maybe her state would ingratiate her with the people around here.

 

The storm clouds had made up their minds to stick around and the rumble of thunder already echoed from the darker skies surrounding the farm on Hickory Lane. Her GPS announced that she had arrived at her destination, and Kara tried not to take its merry tone sarcastically. Waiting on Lena Kent had cost her valuable time that she hadn’t planned on wasting - she had yet to check in to her hotel room, which was supposedly the nicest room that the lone three-star hotel in Smallville had to offer. Things were not off to the greatest start, but it was better than being rejected on sight, as Lex had jokingly texted her to expect when she’d informed him she’d reached Kansas with no problems.

 

Her BMW eased down the long, rock chat driveway to roll to a stop beside a weathered pickup near the front of the house, which had multi-color flowers along the bannister of its porch and in planters beside the steps leading up to it. The combine pulled onto the property a dozen meters up from the driveway and headed towards a broad aluminum building about one-hundred fifty feet from the house, and Kara watched Lena circle around side of it. She squinted and peered in through the wall to see her drive through the wide open doors facing away from the road and then turning off the engine. The other woman opened the door panel and quickly hopped down the steps to the barren ground of the storage unit. 

 

And then she stood there, stock-still. Lena’s head cocked to one side, as if listening for something, but Kara focused in on her location and only heard the crackle of the impending storm.

 

The knock on her window prompted the top of her head to collide with her sun roof with a yelp. An alarmed glance revealed an older woman with lightly tanned skin, wide, bright eyes and a face etched with laugh lines right outside her car. She lifted her palms when she saw Kara’s reaction and waved them non-threateningly.

 

“I’m sorry, are you alright?! I didn’t mean to scare you.” When Kara began to open her door, the woman backed away graciously and waited for her to exit. “I wasn’t expecting anybody or I would have let you know I was coming,” she said with a laugh.

 

This had to be Martha Kent, the holder of the Deed and prime pain in the ass if LCEK was expected to move forward. Though in her sixties, Mrs. Kent had retained a certain exuberance of youth in her looks and there was an air of modest refinement to the woman with her grey-streaked red hair and warm countenance. Kara felt immediately at ease with her.

 

“It’s fine. I… was distracted.” Her peripheral vision caught Lena Kent, still distant but striding toward the house, raindrops decorating her shirt with wet polka dots. Her stern posture indicated to Kara that she only had a few seconds leeway for this to work. “Hi, Mrs. Kent, it’s nice to meet you. I’m a, uh, a friend of your daughter’s; would you mind if I came inside? It’s just that I’ve been driving all day and -”

 

Martha clasped both of Kara’s hands between her own and gripped them fondly, then released them and motioned towards the house. “Of course! Any friend of Lena’s is always welcome. Come in, before this water has us dog-paddling out here.” Kara quickly yanked her bag from the passenger side of her car and let Martha usher her up the porch steps and through the screen door, which was adorned with a metal “K” on the grille. Once their guest was inside, she poked her head out the front door and called to her daughter, “Hurry, honey, or your friend and I are going to have dinner without you!”

 

The decor had its own charm, Kara decided, sweeping her eyes across the walls, shelves and rustic furniture in the Kent living room as she made her way to the comfy-looking sofa angled toward the fireplace. Photographs; photographs were everywhere of the Kents, most starring a dark haired girl at various ages who would be familiar were it not for her twinkling, mischievous smile, and many featured an older man, rugged and bearing an impish half-grin. An inviting mix of cheerful pastels tinted the walls and the whole house smelled of cinnamon. Just as she flopped onto the sofa, knees tensely drawn together, Martha returned her attention to Kara and crossed the room to sit beside her.

 

“So! You know Lena? How? Was it over the internet? What is your name? I  _ know _ you don’t live around here.” As she spoke, Mrs. Kent tipped a tray towards Kara to offer fresh-baked snickerdoodle cookies that were cooling on the coffee table. She grabbed four.

 

Kara could  _ feel _ the pull of the black hole she was ripping open for herself, but she had made a promise to Lex that she would come home with good news. “We, well, we just met, honestly. Up the road. She was having trouble with her… vehicle. And I did what I could to help. I’m Kara.” Instead of shaking her hand, Martha placed hers softly on Kara’s shoulder and just beamed at her.

 

“That’s wonderful! You know, I always worry about Lena - she knows this,” she added quickly, under her breath, eyes flicking towards the door then back, “because it’s so _ isolated _ out here. And she’s such a capable young woman with so much to offer the world. You don’t know what a rarity it is for her to have someone she can relate to, you know, around her own age.”

 

Oh no, oh god, now she’d done it. She didn’t have that killer instinct like the rest of her family, no matter how she tried. Lionel would never have become golfing buddies with a yokel just to make a sale. Was she going to have to befriend these people to buy their land? Lex wouldn’t ever let her live it down if she wound up with only a pen pal out of this whole ordeal. Kara shoved two cookies at once into her mouth, chewed, swallowed, and then painstakingly chose her words as Martha watched her expectantly.

 

“Mrs. Kent, there is  _ another _ reason that I came out here-”

 

“ _ She’s lying! _ ” A metallic bang erupted from the other side of the screen as Lena practically ran into it in her rush to get inside. After some fumbling, she managed to squeeze through with a semblance of dignity. “She’s lying,” she repeated more calmly with her chin uptilted, and pinned Kara with the dirtiest look she’d ever received in her life. “She’s a  _ Luthor _ \- she’s here for the house. Just like the others.”

 

Kara scoffed, and attempted to cover with the appearance of being hurt. “I’m-I’m sorry, I thought we had hit it off back there. You’re a really gifted mechanic.” When Lena’s expression didn’t change, Kara turned instead to Martha when she felt the hand on her shoulder recede. “I didn’t mean anything by it. I only wanted to talk; Lena’s right, that’s why I’m here.”

 

Martha sighed deeply and scooted away from her, against the sofa back. Lena closed and locked the living room door and returned to staring a hole in Kara’s head, leaning against the wall. The wailing of the wind outside and rain water pounding against the exterior were loud enough to distract from the uncomfortable silence, but not by much.

 

“...Please. At least listen to our new offer. Things have changed since one of us came to you last. You’ve become our main priority and we’re prepared to be flexible to an unprecedented degree.” She didn’t even sound convincing to herself. It was this house. All of the memories that had taken place here were thick in the air; a snug sort of pleasantness pressing against the walls, up the stairs to the second floor, all around in a way that made the place seem bigger than it was. Kara couldn’t explain it, but she could sense it. Homes filled with love had an energy all their own.

 

“We’re not selling. We already said the same to your parents and your brother. And all of the middle men that came before them. Half the town is still upset with us for sending them packing when they showed up to plead with us, too.”

 

Lena’s tone was casual, but biting. This was just how she lived ever since plans had been made by forces greater than her to take what didn’t belong to them. Kara wouldn’t have sold either, if it were her family home. But she didn’t want to think about it. Things were different for people from here. Everything they lost they could rebuild; homes, memories, even family. Of course, she empathized with their stance, but that didn't mean they weren’t just as susceptible to the perks of wealth as anyone else on this planet.

 

“I can understand why you might feel like you can’t replace the history of your home, but that just isn’t true. It is never too late to start over, and the best part is you get to choose how you want the rest of your life to go. No compromises over keeping a budget or-” Kara pointedly raised her eyebrows at Lena, who hadn’t broken her gaze, “going without important things like making connections and feeling close to other people?” Lena’s face darkened at Kara’s implication and she turned her head to peer out the window, her jaw clenched.

 

“Kara. Let me ask you something. Now, we don’t want to take from anyone else, or keep anybody from having their own. All we want is to preserve our family -  we’re all we have left - and this home is what grounds us.” Martha shifted closer, into her personal space, to assure that Kara heard every word. “I don’t know if you can imagine it given your upbringing, but there are some things in life we can go without and others we need to survive. Have you ever had something in your life so dear to you, that you would die to protect it?”

 

_ So vivid, the joy glowing from her mother’s face when she had returned from visiting her sister-in-law the day he was born. “And he already has a full head of hair, can you believe?! Dark, curly hair! Oh, Kara, you’re going to love him.” _

 

Mrs. Kent’s squeak of surprise as Kara dropped her two remaining cookies and broke them apart on the wooden floor snapped her back to the present.

 

She jumped up immediately, embarrassed and shaken. “Oh, I’m so sorry. They slid right out of my hand and-”

 

Lena was at her side and without speaking reached down to pick up the pieces and carried them into the kitchen a room over. Mrs. Kent’s mellow blue eyes watched her with a worried curiosity. “Sweetheart, are you alright?”

 

Kara wanted out. She wanted to be in Metropolis in her office, in bed, trapped in an elevator - anywhere was better than here with these people who were ready to defy anyone who came at them just to hold onto an old, crooked, creaky farm house in the middle of nowhere. Simply because it was theirs. Their whole world.

 

“...How long do you think this storm will last?” Kara was able to ask after a deep exhale. Some of the lights were flickering and the thunder would occasionally shake the walls. How was this place still standing? She pulled out her phone from her bag to find out for herself how bad she could expect her drive back to Smallville to be.

 

“Well, you know what they say about Kansas weather,” Lena replied, sauntering back into the room. “If you don’t like it, wait five minutes.” There was something teasing about the way she said it, but Kara was too distracted by the text from Alex she was finally getting around to checking to pay it much thought.

 

She whipped around to face Martha, who had a television remote in front of her on the coffee table, presumably for the mid-sized LCD mounted over the fireplace. “Mrs. Kent?! Could you please turn on the news? There’s - my friend just sent me a text and there’s something going on.”

 

“Of course, I was just about to check the weather anyhow.” Martha did so quickly, Kara’s distress evident.

 

Whatever sitcom rerun that was scheduled to air had been preempted by breaking news. Across the bottom of the screen it read “MASS GRAVE DISCOVERED IN NEVADA DESERT - OVER 2000 BODIES RECORDED AND COUNTING.” A male news anchor narrated the video which was an overhead shot of what looked to be a crater, filled with humanoid corpses. Bones, mostly. Shrapnel. Some scraps of dark, dirty clothing could be sighted, if Kara squinted. Another shot from a different camera panned along the ground, and the news anchor warned for graphic images as skeletons, piled atop each other filled the screen.

 

Lena gasped somewhere close by, but Kara was riveted by the horror on the television. She noticed it when the camera shifted back into an overhead shot. Half buried specks of green which shimmered when the light hit the stones just right. She didn’t believe what she was seeing at first, but the camera returned to a ground shot and she could see chunks of it clearly. Kryptonite. The crater was encircled with Kryptonite. A bolt of lightning struck nearby outside with a booming explosion, and the house was submerged in darkness. But too late. Kara had seen the image that Alex had texted her about just before the Kent residence lost power.

 

A black strip of cloth wrapped around the torso and shoulder of one of the corpses was emblazoned with what, while battered and faded, had once been the diamond-shaped insignia of a Kryptonian crest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Going to try and update every few days. Thanks for the encouraging comments and kudos, fam.


	3. Chapter 3

_Twelve years ago_

 

_The entire facility was on high alert for any disturbances or abnormalities within and outside of the perimeter. LuthorCorp paramilitary combed the white, sterile hallways, weapons drawn to maintain the most rigorous security restrictions ever enacted at the compound. All staff was on-hand today, and wouldn’t be allowed to leave unless cleared by the highest echelons of the company. “Lockdown” didn’t begin to cover the measures enforced to prevent prying eyes from interrupting what could be the most monumental event in human history taking place inside the walls of Thorul Airbase._

 

_“Where is she right now?” asked the very distinguished gentleman with a gaggle of scientists and security trailing him. He wore a sharp, tailored suit befitting a man of his wealth, but kept his grey hair long; a point of pride and an indicator that he wasn’t beholden to societal expectations for owners of multinational corporations._

 

_“The subject is currently in detention bay number four, sir,” replied his personal assistant, short with glasses and the only employee in attendance used to keeping up with his boss’ gait. “And the Pentagon has been trying to reach you again; they may be getting cold feet over outsourcing this one to LuthorCorp.”_

 

_Lionel Luthor chuckled good-naturedly. “Ah! They wouldn’t be feds if they knew how to do it right the first time. Have flowers sent to the wives of all the Joint Chiefs of Staff. I should let them know I think well of them - and let their husbands know that I’ve not forgotten their mistresses.”_

 

_“Classic and classy, Mr. Luthor.” He cleared his throat. “And sir, while you were exiting the jet, we finally got a call back about the... erm... alternative healer from Haiti we’ve been trying to contact. Her son informed us that, unfortunately, she died two years ago.” The assistant focused on the toes of his shoes, knowing what a blow this information was to his boss._

 

_Lionel’s step faltered for a moment but he carried on down the corridor. “I see. And what of the naturopath in Tasmania? Has he responded to our offer?” His voice was low, intentionally devoid of emotion._

 

_“Not yet, sir. I’ll keep you updated.”_

 

_Lionel nodded, face pinched and suddenly ashen, and picked up his pace._

 

_An armed escort led the troupe through the winding halls, past more labs, cells and uniformed underlings than Lionel could count, until finally ending the trek at a steel reinforced door with a keypad next to it. Lionel stooped in front of it and allowed it to scan his retina, and the door slid open with the soft puffing sound of the air seal breaking. His assistant entered the room behind him and tapped the internal wall panel to seal the door closed._

 

_Inside was a control room with two steel walls, a third that contained an entry into a chamber connected to the detention cell, and a one-sided mirror made of reinforced glass with a control panel beneath it. On the other side of the glass was a young girl, around twelve or thirteen, dressed in white. The two scientists seated at the control panel followed every move she made in fascination. She sat hunched in a metal chair, head in her hands, the food and water laying out on the steel table before her untouched._

 

_“How’s she doing?” asked Lionel as a greeting, walking over to the closest scientist and laying a hand on her shoulder. “She’s not hungry?”_

 

_“The subject appears quite fixated on locating another of its kind that it believes to already be here on the planet, sir. We infused the beverage with anxiety suppressing agents but it refuses to ingest anything until it speaks with someone who will help it complete some kind of mission.”_

 

_Lionel’s brows raised at this. “She’s requesting aid?”_

 

_The second scientist made a disgruntled noise and shook his head. “We can’t believe a word it says, sir. For all we know it’s here to scout for an invasion of Earth. Customs agents discovered it in that craft in the middle of the desert. Why would anyone, even an extraterrestrial, send a child alone to another planet, without any idea of how to navigate the world it landed on?”_

 

_“Well, I dunno,” responded Lionel, chipper. “Why don’t I ask her?”_

 

_The girl in the detainment cell brushed her dark blonde hair away from her face and wiped at her eyes, her expression pained and awash in tears._

 

 _“She looks as though she could use a friend. And friends_ confide _in each other.”_

 

_Both scientists stared at him in terror, and his assistant, though trembling, stepped in his path to the chamber that lead into the other room. “Mr. Luthor, I’m sorry, but you shouldn’t go in there. Anything could happen.”_

 

 _“_ Anything _\- what a hopeful word,” said Lionel, leisurely pushing past him. “Has she been at all violent?”_

 

_“No, sir,” the male scientist replied quietly. “She’s… It acts just like a kid in emotional distress.”_

 

_Lionel placed his palm against the panel beside the interlocking chamber. “My friends, I’ll see you on the other side.” No one stopped him this time, and he entered the first chamber, cleared the retina scan inside, and continued into the cell with the alien from another planet._

 

_“Hello, there-”_

 

_“I need to find my cousin, Mr. Luthor. He’s only a baby and he’s got no one else.”_

 

_It was then that Lionel realized that she’d heard everything her captors had been discussing. And that she had been sitting here waiting for him since she’d learned who was in charge. The girl was falling apart, but she met his gaze with an intensity that promised terrible things for anyone who tried to stop her. He sank down into the metal chair across from her at the table, reached over to pluck one of the baby carrots from her plate and ate it whole._

 

_“Of course. Anything you need. And your name, sweetheart?”_

 

_“My name is Kara Zor-El and I come from the planet Krypton. My pod can track other Kryptonian energy signatures. I need to use it to find the ship my cousin Kal arrived in.” She sniffled and turned to eye the two-sided mirror, plainly watching his three bumbling employees lose their minds at what they were beholding. “I don’t want to hurt anyone but I have a duty to fulfill. So will you help me?”_

 

 _The smile on Lionel’s face began as a quirk of his lips and slowly spread to a wolfish grin that took twenty years off his looks. “Help you? Well, Kara, you can consider that_ my _duty from this moment forward.”_

 

_Kara Zor-El nodded, let out a breath she’d been holding for twenty-four years, and cried like a child who’d watched their entire world go up in flames._

 

-

 

“Ms. Luthor? Ms. Luthor, there’s breakfast.” A soft voice in her ear awoke her, unfamiliar sounds and smells fuzzily crossing her senses as she returned to coherency. “Do you like your eggs scrambled or would you rather have an omelet?”

 

Kara opened her eyes. Sunlight filtered in through a window from an angle she didn’t recognize. To her right, standing over her, was a woman dressed in a red and black flannel shirt partially tucked into her jeans, with luminescent green eyes observing her intently. Lena’s hair was loose around her face and still damp, and Kara could pick up wisps of her shampoo, clean and lightly tropical. Kara glanced to her left and placed the pattern as that from the sofa she’d been sitting on last night.

 

Oh, right. The power had gone out and the Kents had protested when she wanted to leave in the night, the storm, devastating questions and memories pressing in on her. Martha had apologized so profusely for the shelf stable dinner that Kara would have felt like an asshole for leaving afterward. So here she was, couch-surfing in their living room, covered over with a camouflage print fleece blanket and suddenly self-conscious about how disheveled she must appear compared to Lena, fresh and vital, with a flush to her cheeks and somehow smelling like dew and cut grass.

 

“Did you just get in from outside?” Kara asked, her voice still raspy from sleep.

 

Lena shrugged and fidgeted with her belt, almost coming off as shy. “I had to swap out the expulsion fuse in the transformer so that mom could use the stove this morning. I’ve got to go to town later and get a new one; it’s always good to keep a spare on hand.” She crossed her arms over her chest and bucked her chin. “So. Eggs?”

 

Rolling to a sitting position, Kara checked her phone on the coffee table. 8:17 am. Wow, she had slept in. But peacefully and deeply, which was one of those things you didn’t notice was missing until you found it again. “Um, scrambled, I guess. But you two really don’t have to worry about me, you’ve done more than enough already.” As Kara stretched her arms over her head, her stomach roared long and resoundingly to the point of betrayal. “Heh. Just one egg, maybe…”

 

“Oh, you don’t know how my mother cooks. Good luck with that,” Lena retorted, and pointed to a door on the other side of the stairs. “There’s a bathroom over there if you need to freshen up, and let me know if you need help getting your bags from your car.”

 

Kara jolted fully awake. “Wait, what? My bags? Why would I need my bags, my hotel’s in Smallville,” she blurted out before she could quash the slight note of panic. “I mean, not that I don’t appreciate you letting me stay.” Forcing; forcing her was what she meant. Mrs. Kent had threatened to stick a club on her steering wheel if she attempted to drive out in tornado weather. She had to admit, she’d been surprised that Lena had agreed with her mother so easily after the cold reception when they first met.

 

“Your hotel’s there, yes, but the owners aren’t. They live in the country on the other side of town, and the bypass is completely flooded - according to the radio, some of the roads around here have actually washed away. Besides, one of the downed trees hit their building so it will be a while before they open shop again anyhow. It’s a shame the funnel cloud didn’t touch ground last night or you could have experienced a proper Smallville welcome,” explained Lena, answering all of Kara’s questions before she had the chance to ask. There was a light behind her eyes when she spoke, a tremor to her lips, as if she was trying to not laugh. She stepped away from the sofa and crossed the room to enter a closet behind the front door.

 

Kara followed her with her eyes. “Okay, so…” After a moment, Lena returned with a portable chainsaw slung over her shoulder. “...So I’m just gonna die here, then? I see now that I probably owed all those Rob Zombie movies more credence.”

 

Lena chuckled low in her throat and shook her head self-deprecatingly and Kara was taken aback by the realization of how attractive Lena Kent was right now. “There’s a few trees down out back. Good for firewood this winter once they’ve dried out.” She walked past the sofa and continued into the kitchen. “Don’t let her tell you she isn’t starving, mom, because she’s lying. Again. And she prefers scrambled. I’ll be in the back forty if you need me.”

 

Kara rolled her eyes, though a warm shiver ran through her at Lena’s words. But it was Martha’s that really had her thrown.

 

“There’s a rainbow out there this morning, honey,” said Martha, quietly, more quiet than a human would have been able to pick up. “They don’t make ‘em like this in the city. Maybe you should ask Ms. Luthor once she’s been fed if she’d like to go see it with you?”

 

“ _Mom!_ ” And Lena’s voice was loud enough for humans in Smallville to hear.

 

“What?”

 

“Don’t. Start.”

 

 _“_ Wh _aaat?”_ Mrs. Kent was worse at containing her laughter than her daughter and giggled to herself as the back door in the kitchen opened and then slammed closed.

 

The sizzle of bacon, eggs, what Kara was certain had to be french toast, and faint humming as Martha Kent finished with the meal wafted through the stillness of the Kent house. Kara reached for her phone, a little regretful to break the tranquility with otherworldly anxiety, and searched for news stories on the mass grave that had been discovered the day before. Why would Kryptonite be there, arranged like a border between whatever had happened to cause that crater and the rest of the world? There were no other Kryptonians on this planet. She was alone here.

 

The first story she read was from CatCo Online and claimed that the crater was actually a government nuclear testing site that had been decommissioned twelve years ago after a single use. Another site explained that the nuclear radiation was to blame for the strange and disfigured remains with which many of the corpses were afflicted. And one article from an admittedly unreputable source speculated that the crater had been the site of an alien spaceship landing and that someone or something had obliterated it as a defensive measure. The number that kept popping up was twelve. Someone had seen a mushroom cloud twelve years ago in the Nevada desert, another claimed to have witnessed soldiers they believed to be black ops driving toward the site twelve years ago in military vehicles the night of their Vegas wedding. One man shared a short story about seeing a small metal speck fall from the sky and land in the desert twelve years ago. It could have been her.

 

Was it possible that there had been other Kryptonians who escaped the explosion of Krypton and arrived right after her? How did anyone else know about it? And who could the other aliens have been, if Kryptonite was only dangerous to her race? Did whoever planted it know about Kryptonians and went the extra mile to make sure any on site would die with all the rest? The only people who even knew about her weakness to the green mineral from her homeworld were her family and the Danvers. It didn’t make any sense.

 

The shifting of footsteps in the kitchen signaled that Martha Kent was about to enter the living room and Kara turned off her screen and placed her phone back on the table. The Kents were already freaked out enough by her reaction to the news last night, especially Lena. No need to make them suspicious of her, too, by divulging a special interest in mass graves.

 

“Here you go! I hope you like bacon - I forgot to have Lena ask. And I put cheese in your eggs, if that’s alright.” Mrs. Kent, dressed in slacks and a fuzzy sweater, carried in a plate loaded with food in one hand and a tall glass of orange juice in the other. “Lena had cold pop tarts this morning before she made repairs outside, so there’s plenty extra.”

 

The urge to weep tears of joy surged through her when the plate slid in front of her, fork already in place, but the content yet curious way Martha watched her reach for her food made her hesitate. “Not to sound ungrateful, but… why are you being so nice to me?”

 

“Because you haven’t brought up LCEK all day,” replied Martha immediately and a little cuttingly. “And, because I understand who you are and what that means, so there must be something exceptionally trustworthy about you, or else my daughter would have run you on up the road by now.”

 

“I guess.”

 

“No guessing. Lena is a fine judge of character.” She nudged the orange juice closer to Kara, and tipped her head at her plate. “Now eat while it’s hot. Who knows when the power will get knocked out again.”

 

Kara considered her advice and then smiled broadly at Mrs. Kent. “Thank you. And can I tell you, I am honestly more excited to eat this french toast than I was when I got my first car.”

 

Mrs. Kent dissolved into laughter, and Kara devoured her breakfast in the warm, soothing sunlight of the Kent family room.

 

-

 

_Twelve years ago_

 

_The trucks were still out there in the dark, lined along the bank since this morning. They had edged down the Missouri river throughout the day, and the yellow lights flashing on the roofs of the utility vehicles could be mistaken for Fire & Rescue were it not for the LuthorCorp logos stamped on their sides. There were lights in the water now, voices calling out, and the rumbling of engines as men with nets stretched across the river between two boats coasted up and down the body of water. Floating on buoys was a piece of equipment that resembled a crane which hadn’t been there this morning when he had driven by on his way to the fishing creek. _

 

_Jonathan Kent recognized a dredge when he saw it. Back when Lena was in grade school, the baker’s boy had disappeared one Saturday night and after two days one of the youths in town confessed that there had been a party with underage drinking on the riverbank over the weekend. A search and rescue crew had assembled, composed of people from all over the county, including himself. The next city over lended them a dredge to use for dragging the river. They had been lucky and had barely begun the process when it proved its effectiveness._

 

_Though he’d never been able to put into words to Martha just why he’d gone and broke Lena’s heart one summer years later when he refused her request to attend the junior 4-H overnight camp near the river, the wails of the boy’s mother as they’d fished his body from the depths still echoed in his mind when he smelled fresh bread._

 

_He pulled off the road, pocketed his keys and shut the pickup door behind him loud enough to garner attention. A dozen flashlights blinded him as he approached the bank. “Howdy there! Everything alright? Anything I can do to help?”_

 

_“Who are you?” A woman’s voice, icy and commanding, arose over the muttering from the crew gathered around the vehicles._

 

_“Jonathan Kent. I live on Hickory Lane not far from here. You folks lose something in the river?” Thanks to the darkness and the beams of light in his eyes, he still had no visual on who he was speaking with._

 

_“I would recommend that you get back in your truck and head home, Mr. Kent. Hold your family close and forget what you saw here. We’ve got it covered.”_

 

_“Ma’am! Ma’am, we’ve got it!” a man’s voice from the direction of the water shouted, and several blue-tinted LED spotlights emitting from the tops of the trucks panned to hover over the surface of the river. Slowly, something was raised from the water near the dredge, gears grinding in the night from the weight of it. A metallic edge of whatever it was broke the surface and continued being lifted into the air. Jonathan squinted when he caught sight of what appeared to be a funny sort of windshield on the lustrous form, cracked and leaking water as it arose higher._

 

_“Grab him! Get him before he takes off, we don’t need any more complications!” Four armed men in helmets and vests had apprehended him and were carrying him over to the riverbank before Jonathan had even understood the woman’s orders. “Take the poles off the rack on his truck and throw them in the water.”_

 

_“Wait, now, hold on a minute! Calm down, we, we can talk about this!” Jonathan’s pleas fell on deaf ears as he was shoved closer to the water, slipped and fell to his knees in the mud. Two of the men grabbed him around his arms and dragged him to the edge. Above him, out in the river, was the glimmering of what Jonathan, even through his frantic thoughts, could only concede was an alien spaceship. “What in the hell is goin’ on?!”_

 

_“Make it look like an accident,” was his only response. The woman sounded closer now but he couldn’t turn to see her as the men holding him yanked him bodily into the water. It was cold, and he thought of how he’d been plotting with Lena to surprise Martha with a family picnic and fishing trip on her birthday if it wasn’t too cold out, but, no, this wouldn’t do for his girls. The lower body of another man stepped into his view and he realized with shock what the heavy stone in his hand was for an instant before it slammed into his right temple. Jonathan fell face-first into the water and the men gripping his shoulders pressed down, down, a knee on his back until he couldn’t fight anymore._

 

_Watching the Kryptonian pod be lowered into the back of the transporter and the doors closed around it, Lillian Luthor tsked. “I warned my husband that simple folk don’t necessarily make for a simple task.” She turned on her heel and allowed her escort to open the front side passenger door of the LuthorCorp transport. “And be sure you pack up the meteor rocks you found down river. Those may prove to be interesting.”_

 

_Jonathan Kent’s pickup truck remained by the side of the road as the LuthorCorp vehicles pealed away into the night, the pendant hanging from his rearview mirror displaying a photo of his wife and daughter swinging gently with the wind._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These chapters keep getting longer, sorry for the wait. I'm loving the questions in the comments and am relieved that you're wondering the things you're supposed to be wondering and not things that deliver me into plot hole hell. Thanks for reading.


	4. Chapter 4

Dr. Alex Danvers was not a woman to be undervalued. Her staff, consisting of sixteen of the most talented biomed engineers in the country, understood how important her leadership was to the NatGen Motion Analysis Lab. They appreciated the dedication and pure force of will that pushed their boss to build their department into one of the top twenty treatment centers for neurological and mobility impairment in the world. Plus, she let them build robots for people all day in a genuinely positive, nurturing environment. So whenever Lillian Luthor, generous donor to the hospital and personal friend of the foundation president stormed into her wing, everyone knew it would be a day of gritting their teeth and holding their tongues.

 

“Ms. Danvers! A word.”

 

Alex whispered encouragement into the ear of the six year old boy using the touch screen panel in the wall to test his reactions, patted his back, and about-faced to behold the Luthor matriarch, dressed to the nines in a cream colored flowy number straight off a runway and wearing her signature disdainful look of appraisal that matched everything she owned.

 

“Mrs. Luthor, hello. If you don’t mind, we can speak in my office.” Alex ushered Lillian away from her patients in the lab’s physical therapy center and towards the modest but state-of-the art room she had wound up sleeping in the desk chair of last night. Lillian Luthor was not a patient and should not have been allowed behind reception without her permission but as with most things Luthor, she was the exception to the rule.

 

Lillian allowed herself to be directed to a seat in front of her desk, and Alex locked the door and pulled the blinds to assure their privacy. Never one to show in person unless it was regarding some clandestine ordeal, Alex wondered if today she would be pressured for information from the system about a business rival’s medical condition or expected to sign off on strange prescriptions for vague symptoms which Mrs. Luthor never seemed to be suffering from while making her demands. Denying a Luthor required an outrageous amount of maneuvering and inner resources to pull upon, and if Alex was honest, she had (by necessity) grown stronger and more sure of herself as a result of interacting with Lillian and unlearning the guilt that came with saying no. But that didn’t stop the woman from returning to try again and again.

 

You befriend one Luthor and the others draft you into a war to fight to the death for your optimism. Lillian was a human disillusionment factory and made a habit of declaring awful things about the way the world _really_ worked as passing asides, and worse, she was generally correct. So with all of her money and power, Alex wished she would find another doctor to harass for these things and leave her out of it. But Lillian didn’t because she trusted Alex. Because Kara did. Which didn't necessarily connote Alex’s moral fiber, but keeping her best friend’s secret without having to threaten and silence people was a skill even the Luthors could respect.

 

There was a hardness to the set of her jaw, a steel behind Lillian’s eyes that hit like a blunt force to Alex’s psyche. Kara’s mother had the nerve to bare her pristine white teeth at her, and Alex knew that this was no ordinary visit. A churning in her gut triggered an uncomfortable, sickly warmth to spread throughout her body, as if it preternaturally knew that every plan she’d ever made could come undone as a consequence of conversation with this asp of a woman. Alex let the corners of her mouth pinch in a ghost of a smile and took a seat behind her desk. “Now, Mrs. Luthor. How may I help you?”

 

Lillian took her time, made a show of the trepidation she wanted Alex to believe she was feeling. “Alexandra… You know that my family and I see you as one of our own,” she began, with a straight face. When Alex didn’t react, she continued, allowing more of her customary lazy purr to slip into her cadence, a tone designed to eke tension from her quarry to the surface like traitorous sap from a tree. “So if Kara were in any kind of… distress or state of _concern_ , you would feel free to let me know, wouldn’t you?”

 

If she blinked, the game was over. Alex realized three things simultaneously: One, that Lillian was here to find out what Kara knew about the alien mass grave site the media was reporting as a nuclear weapon testing ground. Two, that Kara’s mom was deeply troubled by Alex knowing more about aliens than most daughters of iconoclast astrobiologists on the planet and moreso by the prospect of her choosing to share her knowledge with Kara. And three - if she were to discover that Alex had immediately texted Kara about the Kryptonian symbols she’d noticed when the news broke, this could spiral into a profoundly unpleasant exchange.

 

Alex recalled the last day that Lillian ever darkened the doorstep of her family home as a teenager, Kara conspicuously absent. Mrs. Luthor had never spoken so softly and sweetly to her mother as she did when she offered the Danvers all of the money in the world to move far away and cut contact with Kara, now trained in the use of her abilities well enough to safely suppress them. She remembered how her mother had strained to control the volume of her voice when she had used words Alex only heard under her roof in anger after a stubbed toe or misjudged slice of a vegetable knife. And when Lillian turned cold and sharp, her mom became stone.

 

No threat to their professional reputation, Alexandra’s likelihood of being accepted into a decent university, or even of abstract perils to their well-being could sway Eliza Danvers into turning her back on Kara Zor-El. Standing in the next room with an eye peering around the doorframe, Alex watched her mother turn down a deal with the devil and she had never felt more proud of her integrity and of the love in her heart. She drew from that strength now.

 

Alex didn’t blink. “I’m not sure what you mean, Mrs. Luthor,” she replied, creeping some faux alarm into her response. “Is Kara alright? Is there something wrong?”

 

“Wrong? No, not that I’m aware of. Have you heard from her? She’s still in Kansas as far as I know.”

 

“Yes, I spoke with her a few hours ago. She said the storm was pretty wild there last night and the town lost power. She hasn’t had the chance to make progress with her clients. Is that what you think may be bothering her?” That night years ago when she and Kara stayed up late marathoning Disney movies instead of practicing dampening Kara’s hearing using pots and pans finally paid off when Alex fluttered her eyelashes with the innocence of a newborn cartoon fawn.

 

A sneer began creeping across Lillian’s face, her frustration palpable. “She’s said nothing about any current events?”

 

“Nope. Maybe they don’t have television out there.” Alex quirked her eyebrows expectantly when Lillian didn’t reply.

 

After a solid eight seconds of searching Dr. Danvers’ face, Lillian Luthor exhaled loudly through her nose, and rose swiftly from her seat. “I see. Well, if you hear anything out of the ordinary, contact me at your earliest convenience,” which meant as soon as possible when bending to a Luthor’s will was more convenient than the alternative. A swirl of chiffon and every step Lillian retreated towards the door, Alex could breathe a little easier.

 

“Will do, Mrs. Luthor. Have a nice day.” Alex dismissed her with a cordial, tight-lipped smile and a nod as she exited the office.

 

The click-clack of Lillian’s heels stopped abruptly once she had entered the hallway, part of her purse framed in the empty doorway. The woman’s face, eyes bright and narrowed, scared away Alex’s pangs of relief when it reappeared to stare her down. “By the way, wish your girlfriend happy birthday for me. It’s in less than a week, isn’t it?”

 

Never, _never_ had Alex discussed her personal life with Kara’s mother, especially not Maggie. Not Maggie. She could not become wrapped up in this mess. “Um. Yes.” And then she saw it, that predatory smirk like a hunter surveying a sprung trap. Lillian had planned for this to be her big finish. She’d known Alex wouldn’t cooperate before she’d even arrived. Of course she did. Kara was the only Luthor capable of having faith in people.

 

“I believe I’ll send her flowers given she’s practically family after all. Do you think she would prefer them sent to her cubicle at the station or her house on 31st Street?”

 

Alex hadn’t noticed she had been fidgeting nervously with the tiny robot dog she used as a paper weight until she accidentally tapped the power button and it began moving on her desk, growling a tinny little protest. “One of my interns built that for me, sorry.” Lillian made a self-satisfied sound, but didn’t pounce. “I, um, I should really get back to work.”

 

“As should I. Much to do. You understand…” And with the most sinister wink Alex had ever received, her visitor took her leave and continued down the hall and out of her workspace. Once she was certain the area was clear, Alex left her desk and reached for the door, examined the outside of it, closed the door and examined the inside. Finding nothing of note, walked to the chair Lillian had occupied and flipped it upside down, running her fingers along the legs and underside carefully. Satisfied, she returned it to its spot and slid her hand along the front and bottom edge of her desk. Nothing. Her office was clean. Lillian hadn’t planted any listening devices.

 

_Mom_ displayed on her phone beneath a picture of a blonde woman standing on a beach as Alex locked her door and began pacing around her office. After three rings, her mother answered.

 

_“Hi, honey! Don’t usually get to hear from you this time of day; are you at work?”_

 

“Yeah. Mom, listen.” Alex couldn’t help but separate the blinds in her office window using two fingers to try to pick out the creme colored speck far down below in the parking lot outside. It could have been her in the limo already pulling out of the main entrance drive. “Lillian Luthor just left. Something’s up, and I think it has to do with that thing in Nevada. She wanted to know if I had told Kara anything, or if she’d told me anything or - I don’t know what she’s worried about but it’s big.”

 

_“Lillian could have just called your father and I about it if she wanted to know. We caught the Kryptonian alphabet right off. And those bones belong to a variety of extraterrestrial species, most based from homeworlds outside of our solar sys-”_

 

“I’m sure Mrs. Luthor knows that, too. Look, you and dad need to get out of the house for a few days; maybe go to the city. I have no doubt she’ll be paying you a visit and if she’s this paranoid that _I_ know something I shouldn’t, then I don’t see her prioritizing social niceties when she redirects her warpath your way.”

 

_“...Alright. I’ll let Jeremiah know to pack a bag. What about you, Alex, are you alright? What will you do?”_

 

Alex went to her closet and pulled out her jacket and bag, snatched her keys from her desk and headed for the door herself. “I’m fine; you know me, mom. I’ll be smart about this and do what people trapped in horror movies mostly forget about.” Lillian Luthor really thought that ambiguously menacing her girlfriend was a good play? And what, Alex would silently agonize and wring her hands over her safety? That woman was about to learn that choosing Maggie Sawyer for her damsel-in-distress was the most dire miscast she could have made. “I’m going straight to the police.”

 

-

 

“I don’t understand how this tastes so much better.”

 

“But it does?”

 

“But it does; I guess there is something about homemade that you just can’t get anywhere else.”

 

Martha Kent, preening slightly, refilled Kara’s glass of lemonade. “Well, it’s organic. Everything we grow is. We’re the biggest source of organic produce in the Tri-State area.”

 

Dressed in slacks with a casual blouse and blazer, Kara felt fresh and oddly younger after showering and eating one and a half breakfasts. After she had refused to bother Lena working out back, Martha “helped” bring in her bags and placed them in a spare room next to Lena’s upstairs, with an old, but comfortable twin bed. It would serve as her residence until she could leave town without being air lifted or just plain flying away herself. The look Mrs. Kent gave her when she suggested paying room and board almost had her shooting off into the sky for her own safety anyway. Making the sale felt less important now, as though this place had nearly sung the Luthor ambition-fed beast in her to sleep and maybe, just maybe she would follow Alex’s suggestion and try to enjoy herself. But even then, her Earth mother’s voice echoed in her mind: _“This world will run you over if you don't stand your ground, Kara.”_

 

Having already guzzled her second glass of lemonade made straight from the Kent greenhouse, Kara remembered just how large a tract of land the farm was. “Isn’t it hard to manage this place with just you and Lena?”

 

“Oh, sure, absolutely… but sometimes we have help.” Martha arose from the living room recliner next to the sofa and headed for the kitchen, giving Kara the inkling that she was being evasive intentionally. But before she could further pursue her curiosity, she heard footsteps in the grass outside, and peered through the back half of the house to see Lena approaching the patio out back. From her frown and unfocused gait, she was deep in thought, the chainsaw dangling from one hand.

 

“Mrs. Kent?”

 

“Yes, sweetie?” she called from the kitchen.

 

It wasn't that Kara didn't respect their wishes. She just didn't get _why_ the Kents were so adamantly anti-LCEK. Yes, Lex called them stubborn and he wasn't wrong. But the Kents seemed like smart, caring people. Surely they understood that the wind farm would elevate the entire community. These were decent humans. Maybe it shouldn't bother her on a personal level… but was the sticking point the sale of their house or was it that it would be an advantage to the Luthors?

 

If it were her, would she trade her home for the sake of everyone around her?  No… that train of thought was a different issue altogether. She was trying to escape the images looping on television last night, not lean into them and let that waking nightmare overshadow her. Even in the calm early afternoon lucidity of the farmhouse, there were looming questions in the back of her mind, scratching and acidic and unkind. She would take her adoptive father's advice. _Whenever life makes you feel something that you can't use, invest it elsewhere._

 

“Do you really think that when you're gone and Lena’s an old woman, she’ll be better off here than she would have somewhere else with a hefty inheritance? Will these walls even hold long enough for her to find a way to be happy living like this?”

 

Mrs. Kent appeared in the kitchen doorway, tension emanating off of her and face tinged with pink. “Excuse me?” she asked hoarsely.

 

Kara knew this was a sensitive issue, but part of her wanted to agitate it, to force it into the light. Their lives weren't all lemonade and sunshine no matter how pleasant compared to her own, and if the Kents were so resolute in their decision, what harm could it do to challenge their reasoning? And sure. Part of her cared. It couldn't be helped when her first impression of somebody like Lena was _incapacitated and alone_. It didn't seem fair.

 

“Is this about the land again?” Martha was on the defense immediately, and Kara could tell that she was hurt… and a little ashamed. Lena's future wasn't a new contemplation for her, not at all.

 

“ _Is_ it?” Kara got up and followed her into the kitchen when Martha turned away at her approach. “I’m not going to say that convincing you to go live some glamorous life in France or Hawaii wouldn’t be in my family’s best interest. But have you truly decided that staying here is in yours? In Lena’s?”

 

The back door flew open and the woman in question stepped through, read the room when both her mother and Kara guiltily swerved to look at her, and sighed. “Mom, would you put this back in the closet, please,” she asked, handing her mother the chainsaw. She gave Martha a coded glance and then beckoned to Kara with one hand. “Ms. Luthor. There’s a rainbow outside. How would you like to accompany me to go see it?”

 

Caught off guard, Kara opened her mouth wordlessly for a moment before responding. “Um. Okay?”

 

“Wonderful. Grab your bag, we may be out a while.” Lena breezily kissed Martha on the cheek and bypassed Kara, one eyebrow raised, to head for the front door, grabbing a set of keys hanging on the wall when she arrived. “Perhaps you wouldn’t mind heading to town and getting a feel for the locals after? Unless you two want to continue this obviously not about me heated conversation?”

 

Kara glanced down at the chainsaw in Martha’s arms. “Nope, I’m good. See you later then, Mrs. Kent…?” She tried her best to convey an apology with only her face, hoping to avoid incriminating herself even further with Lena by saying it aloud.

 

In what likely mirrored her own expression, Martha nodded emphatically. “Yes, yes, of course. You two be careful driving. The water’s still high all around.”

 

Once they were outside, Lena motioned for Kara to walk with her and they fell into step together. The slight breeze and tinge of humidity lended the air a summer vacation vibe, and Kara found herself taking deep breaths as she accompanied Lena behind the house and towards the barn. Or what had appeared to be a barn, but a quick scan over it revealed electrical wiring running through the walls and ceiling and furniture placed on the second story, which seemed to function as a makeshift loft. Soft golden Christmas lights were strung along all of the wooden rails and the steps leading up to an elevated platform to one side of the barn.

 

“So, what was that back there?” Lena asked, eyes front and breaking the comfortable silence that had settled between them. “It takes a lot to rattle my mom.”

 

“Ah, that was a combo of me overstepping my bounds and your mother thinking I was pushing LCEK again.”

 

“Were you?”

 

They reached the barn entrance, and Kara received a brief smile when she assisted Lena in pulling it open unbidden.

 

“...Not… exactly…” huffed Kara, feigning difficulty as the two of them worked to close the tall, rickety red doors behind them. Once inside, an earthy, dusty and strangely sweet smell overtook the environment. Bales of hay lay stacked against the walls of the ground floor with stray shreds spread around underfoot, serving as cushion and insulation. Above swung a pulley system leading to the rafters. A peculiar assortment of equipment, only partially composed of objects recognizable to Kara as vehicles or at least formerly, stood in the back of the barn with sheet plastic stretching beneath it all. Two lengthy tool chests framed the area on either side, old but well cared for by someone who valued them. A workshop, which Kara assumed belonged to Lena.

 

Hunched over next to her, Lena was flushed and for a moment appeared startlingly delicate in her winded state. “Thank you, but you didn’t have to do that.”

 

“It’s no problem. I’m, ah, tougher than I look.”

 

“I’m getting that,” Lena shot back, with a grin. “Now come on, you can see it from up here.”

 

Kara watched her practically hop up the steps to the platform, clearly in her element and willing to let her guest share in what could only be a special retreat for her. Stretched between two posts comprising the outer edge of the platform was a roomy hammock suspended in the air. A metal card table surrounded by plastic deck chairs with pillows in the seats served as the centerpiece with a filing cabinet and mini fridge in one corner. Short, sturdy bookshelves of dark stained wood lined one side of the second story, packed with a wide and weathered variety of novels, autobiographies, and classic literature.

 

“I ran out of space in the house,” said Lena suddenly, her tone embarrassed. Her eyes lingered on Kara as she gingerly hung her purse on a nail sticking out of a railing and followed her up the second level. “Not ideal but less traumatizing than throwing them out.” She turned away and grasped two wooden bars fitted into the wall, slid them to the right with a grunt and pushed, revealing a set of chest level double doors that split open and streamed in daylight from the other side with the squeal of indignant metal hinges.

 

“So you really did bring me in here to show me a rainbow?” Kara couldn’t help but ask, skeptical but charmed despite her doubts.

 

“Why else would I bring you here?” Lena, face unreadable, let the question hang between them as Kara joined her but stilled at the top of the steps.

 

_To read me the riot act. To tell me to go home and take my filthy Luthor money with me. To tie me to a horse and order it to ride into the sunset._ Lena’s expression shifted into that same one of barely disguised amusement from earlier that morning and heat rose in Kara’s cheeks. _To… No, don’t go there. That… that can’t be what this is._

 

Lena chewed on her lip, surveying Kara momentarily, then shook her head. “You honestly don’t know why we refuse to sell, do you?” She stepped to one side of the open window, leaving half of it unoccupied, wordlessly inviting Kara closer. When she flipped around to face the window, her dark hair billowed lightly in the wind and for a second her profile reminded Kara of something out of a fairytale.

 

“Will you tell me?” Kara accepted the invitation and chalked it up to residual disorientation from last night when her heartbeat picked up as their arms brushed in the confined space framed by the window. Lena’s heart rate mirrored hers, but that could easily be credited to the view.

 

Mrs. Kent hadn’t exaggerated. The radiant array of hues arching over the tan fields in the distance, open-ended and encouraging to those who believed in magic and forever may have changed Kara’s frame of mind were she a little younger, had seen less of the darkness in the world.

 

“About ten years ago, the governor flew into town on a brand new private helicopter and declared that Smallville was under a state of emergency. Not even the local news saw it coming. The story was, our water supply had been contaminated by an exceedingly rare mineral and that we were on quarantine until the materials responsible could be fully eliminated from the area.” Kara could sense, could _feel_ Lena’s eyes raking over her face, searching for a sign of recognition.

 

“I’ve never heard anything about this. What happened?” She didn’t turn to meet Lena’s gaze, somehow afraid of what she would see if she did.

 

“The state outsourced our recovery efforts to one of their _corporate alliance partners_. LuthorCorp? You may be familiar.”

 

Kara only knew of one instance before the last six months that LuthorCorp had done business in Smallville, and it had nothing to do with water purification. Why would they have come back for a small town recovery effort? It couldn’t be coincidence, could it? But if it wasn’t, how come no one told her? What was there to hide? The only thing worth taking from this hellhole was already dead.

 

“Ms. Luthor, hey. You’re shaking. Look at me, _hey._ ” Lena’s voice, soft and low broke her from her introspection, and she shuffled backwards, away from the window until she felt the faintly chilled edge of the card table against her lower back. Lena, brows drawn together and concern written across her face, reached out to her and gently slipped one hand into Kara’s, squeezed her palm and rubbed slow, steady circles over the back of Kara’s hand. “Ms. Luther? Kara? Kara, it’s okay.”

 

Even though it didn’t make any sense - she was fine; she should have been able to but she couldn’t speak. She couldn’t move, nothing in her body would listen to her and it was as if she’d been frozen in time. Lena edged closer to her, carefully enclosed her other hand around Kara’s forearm, inched it up until it slipped behind her elbow and attempted guiding her towards a chair. A pang of homesickness shot through Kara's gut and she found herself missing Alex dreadfully.

 

“Sit down, Kara, come on.” Lena’s face was all that she could see, a stranger with such stark anguish in her eyes that Kara believed her when she said, “I know it’s bad, Kara. I know. Please, please, sit down. Breathe. It’s going to be alright.”

 

This hadn’t happened to Kara in a long time. The last one that hit her like this, she was in middle school and Lex had been there to comfort her. He’d said that he would help her get away, get her out of the country, off-planet, whatever it took to make her happy. Hearing it made her feel better. Even when she knew it was a lie, there was reassurance in the idea that there could be someplace out there where she would feel whole again if she just ran away far enough.

 

Next thing she knew, the side of her face was cool, resting on the table and Lena’s hair was backlit by Christmas lights on the railing behind her as she coaxed Kara to take a sip from a water bottle. “Ughhh. What was it?”

 

“It’s water, if you feel like you can keep it down.”

 

With a speed that made Lena jump, Kara was on her feet, the chair knocked to the floor behind her. She grabbed the water, drank half the bottle in one gulp and placed her hands imploringly on Lena’s shoulders. “ _What was it that LuthorCorp wanted in Smallville?_ ”

 

Lena blinked a few times, confused, then sobered. “It sounds stupid but… the rocks.”

 

“What rocks?” and even as Kara asked, the phantom pain from the only kind of rock she’d ever found relevant coursed through her, nausea on its tail. This was beginning to make the sort of sense that propelled something small and bright inside Kara to begin freefalling into blackness.

 

“They used to be all over the area.” Lena slid out of her grasp easily, and walked towards the filing cabinet. “We managed to save one if you’d like to-”

 

“ _No!_ ”

 

“No!” repeated Lena, immediately after Kara. “That’s fine. Okay then.”

 

“I have... allergies to certain kinds of stones.” Noticing that she’d been rude to the furniture and on the lookout for a distraction, Kara sheepishly picked up her chair and planted herself back in it. She finished the other half of her water and waited for Lena to join her at the table before continuing. “What happened when LuthorCorp was here ten years ago?”

 

“They kept everyone on a strict curfew in town. There were goons everywhere, and most of them were armed. Everything was ransacked - not just houses but the earth itself - these people uprooted trees, drained ponds, ripped through parts of the surrounding farmland.” It had been ten years but Lena was still angry and Kara could see it in the curl of her lip. “They tore the entire town apart searching for meteor rocks. I wasn’t born yet, but there was a meteor shower here years and years ago and many of them were still spread around - this place was even a tourist trap for a while after they fell. No one thought they were worth anything, though. Just green lumps of space debris. Until LuthorCorp came.”

 

Knowing intimately how her family’s company operated, it wasn’t implausible that they could take over a town and impose Martial Law, especially one this tiny and with so much money to throw at it. “So that’s why you won’t sell? Because they stripped the town and, what, left it to rot?”

 

Lena’s smirk was bitter. “Oh, no, the mayor and other community leaders were given handouts to keep everyone from kicking up a fuss after they left. Smallville got a dog park out of it. Mom and I only had to deal with a few of the low level cronies sniffing around out here. Most of them stayed within city limits.”

 

_Just ask. You don’t want to know. But you need to know._ “Why do you think they took the meteor rocks?”

 

“That’s the thing. They stored them out here in the countryside for years and suddenly now they want to stick a turbine right by where they’ve got them stockpiled?”

 

“They’re _here_?"

 

“Yes, about a mile up the road,” Lena said, pointing vaguely to the window.

 

" _Why?"_

  
Lena leveled a look at her, intense and humorless, and spoke slowly so that Kara would weigh her words appropriately. “Because LCEK is a front. LuthorCorp couldn’t care less about a wind farm. Your family only wants our land to build a refinery for their meteor rocks.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry that this chapter took sooo long. I hit a few forks in the road and I finally got it sorted out. Thank you for your patience and feel free to let me know how you feel in the comments. Take care, fam.


	5. Chapter 5

“I want as many photos taken as you can fit on your storage and I don't want any detail to go unrecorded! If you're squeamish, go home! And board yourself up - die there, because this is the future we're looking at here and if you can't handle them dead then you’ll be useless when they're alive, walking our streets!”

 

Hank Henshaw strutted along the outer rim of the grave site, barking orders, double-checking credentials and generally keeping everyone on their toes. Tall and dark-skinned with take-no-shit posture and the mind of a Roman warrior-poet, Agent Henshaw was greatly respected by his colleagues and intimidating to even his superiors. His hazmat suit was rolled down to his waist, a bold statement that silently displayed both his contempt for those who would fear the aliens and reinforced the impotency of the dead in the face of his operation.

 

The cracked, dry patch of sunken earth surrounded by black military vehicles and aircraft with wavy refraction lines closing in on the site in the distance had occupied Henshaw’s every waking moment for the last two days. As the sun beat down on him with a single-mindedness to rival his own, he kicked a foot-long piece of warped metal from his path, construction alien and of lower density than it appeared, and the chunk rolled through the air and landed in the pit. One of the scientists taking soil samples nearby began to protest, but held her tongue when she realized who was responsible for the disturbance.

 

Most of the bodies had been removed and loaded for transport, and would be shipped out and placed in cold storage. Now that the media had been blocked after receiving their trendy, bite-sized clips and buzzwords to loop for their twenty-four hour talking head entertainment news cycle, the real work could begin. The right sorts of organizations were already reading between the lines and forwarding inquiries to the authorities responsible for maintaining the site.

 

Bureaucracy and networking weren't his strong suits, and so ceding the negotiation aspect to the Luthors was a welcome unburdening. Their connections and natural talent for winning corporate and political shell games would serve the government and their company well. When educated buyers grew curious about the true origins of the creatures in the pit and what means had been enacted to eradicate them all those years ago, funding for further development would come flooding in. Those in the know recognized a weapons advertisement when they saw it.

 

A beeping from his bluetooth earpiece alerted him to an incoming call. There were very few numbers that he allowed to break through when he was on a job, and so he stepped away from his patrol and entered the back of one of the empty ground transport vehicles, closed the double doors behind him and settled on one of the bench seats.

 

“Henshaw. Talk to me.”

 

“ _Agent Henshaw, how nice to hear from you. How goes the packing? Do you think you'll, ah, need more plastic wrap?”_ The man on the line chuckled at his own joke. _“You haven't given me an update since this morning. I thought I would check in.”_

 

There were challenges to being in bed with the Luthors; he would admit that, occasionally to their faces and quite adamantly so. One of the most aggravating facets of their little dynasty was the glib way they approached conversation as if engaging with an underling no matter their standing. He did not work for the Luthors. He was a soldier under employ of the United States government, not beholden to spoiled, smart-mouthed dilettantes with fancy, fatal toys, and someday he would have the chance to enlighten them. But until their “group project” was completed, he would wait. And seethe.

 

“I’m just finishing up out here. Been a busy day. I hope you haven’t been waiting by the phone this whole time, twiddling your thumbs.”

 

Lionel Luthor harrumphed, goading him. _“And I hope that you’re not denigrating my interest in how your day is going, Hank. I’ve always found you to be a man worthy of keeping an eye on.”_

 

“I'm sure,” gruffly replied Henshaw, picking up on the distrustful implication. “Don't get your panties in a bunch, Luthor. Everything’s going as planned on _my_ end. You got that kid of yours under control?”

 

A beat, and Agent Henshaw knew he was skating on thin ice by making this personal but there was a thrill in causing a Luthor to squirm that appealed to his lower nature.

 

_“You just focus on hauling your cargo to Cadmus, Hank. Let me worry about my family affairs.”_

 

“I never worry about action, but only inaction.”

 

_“...Churchill. Point taken, Agent. Happy trails, and, uh, try not to get heat stroke out there, hmm? I would be so troubled to hear that you're suffering unduly.”_

 

A smile broke on Hank's face, vicious and sardonic. “The feeling is mutual, Mr. Luthor,” he said. “I'll be in touch.” Without bothering with a goodbye, he ripped the earpiece out and threw it with enough force that it broke to pieces when it collided with the truck’s reenforced wall.

 

“Cannot _stand_ that slimy bastard.”

 

-

 

“You didn't have to drive,” repeated Lena for the third time. “I swear, the truck really does start. Despite appearances.”

 

Kara hadn’t had many opportunities to escort people around, barring Alex just barely surviving teaching her to drive, and had spent the first five minutes on the road adjusting the temperature, defrost and radio. Lena didn't complain, though she seemed tense with her legs shifted towards the passenger door and her hands clasped in her lap. Though Kara would steal glances once in a while to assure that her companion was at optimal comfort levels, Lena was hard to gauge, and kept her eyes glued to the wet gravel road through the windshield.

 

Yes, Kara knew she'd had a meltdown half an hour ago, narrowly avoided another right after and decided that getting behind the wheel of an eight cylinder metal coffin was an effective method of clearing out emotional congestion. But Lena had to know she wouldn't be reckless enough to offer her a ride to town if she couldn't assure her safety. Understandably, Ms. Kent had been quiet since breaking the news about the refinery. Now that the truth was out, it was like she was waiting for the other shoe to drop. Would Ms. Luthor take a stand or would she press on, another bag of her Earth family’s dirty laundry slung across her back?

 

Kara eased off the accelerator minutely. Fifteen miles over the speed limit. It sure did creep up on you when your mind was sorting out the state of your entire life.

 

“I'm sorry, Ms. Kent. I'm not trying to scare you. I would never let anything happen to you.”

 

“It's fine,” she replied, flicking her eyes to Kara's and then back to the road. “And please, just Lena. Only telemarketers and preacher men call me by my last name.” She sounded subdued, almost shy when she said it, but Kara opted to focus on the gravel trail in front of her. No reason to spook her passenger even further.

 

“Well… almost everybody knows me by my last name, and those are the polite ones. So feel more than free to use Kara.” Lena already had when she was pulling her back from the brink, and the accompanying flush to her face at the memory made her pause. This woman was kind to her, more kind than she would ever have expected or deserved and escorting her to Smallville was the least she could do in return.

 

Though being in close quarters with her, alone for an extended period of time was a factor that Kara should have weighed more heavily before embarking. Her senses were picking up every heartbeat, every exhale, the ruffle of clothing whenever Lena moved and her damn shampoo, enduring and impossible to ignore with that curtain of dark hair spread over her shoulders. It was a pleasant brand of frustrating, which coincidentally summed Lena Kent up as a person thus far.

 

“Alright, Kara…” Lena shifted beside her and Kara was secretly relieved to see that she had relaxed in her seat, legs outstretched and neck tilted back against the headrest, long pale throat exposed. “So who are these “impolite” people? Prospective clientele like my mother and I?” she asked, a teasing glint in her eye.

 

Her fingers readjusted their grip on the steering wheel one after another before Kara answered. “Mostly my day-to-day job interactions. This sort of thing,” she clarified with a breathy laugh and a bob of her head at Lena, “isn't typically my speciality, but desperate times, you know?”

 

“So what do you do normally?” Lena’s casual interest in her life flustered and calmed her at the same time. It was a subtle olive branch and Kara wanted to grab on with both hands.

 

“I'm an Employee Restructuring Specialist.” The habit of confessing it with resignation, waiting for the sneers or grunts of disgust was misplaced here, as Lena didn't recognize the meaning of her title anyhow.

 

“Is that like HR?”

 

“Mmm... less like HR, more like hatchet man?"

 

Now she got it, Kara could tell, as she watched Lena's face shift from serene curiosity to genuine surprise. “Isn't that where you fire people for a living?”

 

Finally taking her eyes off the road, Kara shot her passenger an apologetic, self-deprecating smile. “My job is to basically fly around to different LuthorCorp funded facilities - medical, manufacturing, corporate, anything - and tell the most important yet disposable person there that their life is ruined.”

 

Lena’s eyes stayed fixed on her long enough for Kara to wonder exactly what it was Lena was searching for before she finally spoke. “That doesn't sound like it would be much fun.” The undercurrent of pity stung. “Can't say it's the sort of profession I'd have expected would suit you.”

 

Lena had no idea. Working for LuthorCorp had hazards on its own, but firmly establishing yourself as an enemy of a brilliant LuthorCorp employee by being the one to terminate them? Were she not Kryptonian, Kara would be dead fifty times over by now. Her family had the job lined up before she'd even graduated from college, mostly because she'd asked Lex where she could save the most lives in the company and he'd brought up _restructuring_ , half kidding. But Kara had soon come to learn it was near the truth, after the first lab tech she'd been assigned to release had thrown acid in her face, which had burnt through her new blazer, the toes of her heels, and the last pair of fake, vision suppressing glasses she ever bothered to wear.

 

Another scientist she'd let go a month later had followed her to the airport and slipped something in her drink that had sent the security guy who sniffed it to the hospital. Not long after that, a disgruntled former manager had the nerve to send a gang of mooks to her hotel room in the middle of the night, not expecting her call informing him that he, and not LuthorCorp as he was no longer on payroll, was liable for their medical care after they'd been tossed from four stories into the pool below. She’d survived physical attacks, attempted stabbings, shootings, car bombs, poisonings, “freak accidents” and more threats to her life in a single week than all of the other twenty-something one-percenters on social media combined. While it may not have been well suited to her temperament or even her emotional stability, she was without a doubt the most qualified and long-lived ERS in LuthorCorp history.

 

But it wasn't the angry, vengeful ex-employees who stole her breath when she remembered their faces. The workers whose eyes dulled, who caved in on themselves at her approach, who obediently cleaned out their desks through their tears or didn't even attempt to fight back when security overzealously removed them from the premises - those were the people who made her job difficult. HR or management of whatever particular office would sometimes warn her when somebody was likely to get rowdy. Nobody warned her about the ones who were afraid of her. She always remembered the LuthorCorp employees who heard her last name and appeared hauntingly, unforgettably as though they had already been afraid for a very long time. They may have had the right idea, after all.

 

Admitting to Lena just how far her life was from glamorous, or _good_ , honestly, would be strangely embarrassing. Just how thinly stretched the veneer of control and competence was that protected her from complete breakdown wasn't something she preferred to share with people outside of her tiny inner circle. Alex was adept at maneuvering around her without cracking her shell, despite doing everything short of taping her back together. And Lex subscribed to the same philosophy for inner demons as a child who feared monsters in the dark - if you ignored it, it would go away. She'd been trying to follow his example for years, but eventually she would run out of places to bury it all, and she knew it. Nothing stayed buried forever, as the last twenty-four hours confirmed. No matter how fast she was, she couldn't outrun herself.

 

“No, really,” Kara responded, all false cheer and borderline mania. “It's totally rewarding, though my evil laugh leaves much to be desired.”

 

“You can do anything, you know,” Lena murmured like it was a secret for her ears only, head cushioned against the headrest, just watching her. “Life’s too short to feel this way, Kara.”

 

“For who? Me or you?” she spit back, bristling at the insinuation that she hadn't already considered making a change. Her own family could be working towards killing her, and possibly had been for who knew how long - it would have to be a drastic change to course correct after all these years. But Lena, out here in the boonies with her quaint farmhouse and normal person problems couldn’t comprehend the obstacles between Kara and a life she felt at home living. So maybe she did want to scare her a little, Kara decided, meeting Lena’s gaze and ignoring the road until the other woman turned away and faced the passenger window.

 

“Looks like it's going to storm again,” Lena remarked, noticing the dark clouds encroaching above.

 

They were the last words exchanged in the car until they arrived in Smallville.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Argh, sorry for the wait. Kind of throwing this one out early just to put something out there, because I'm still puttering along on this story. Feel free to let me know what you think, thanks for reading.


	6. Chapter 6

Either Smallville had become exponentially more active since she had cruised through, or these people were following them. An elderly couple had clearly been trailing behind Kara, who was trailing after Lena, for at least three different fruit stalls at the Farmer’s Market. Even their fluffball of a dog was sniffing at Kara’s heels whenever she stopped in place long enough for their dismal attempt at stealth to fall through. At first she suspected that they were on high alert for Luthor shenanigans after what Lena had told her of her family's role in devastating the town a decade ago. But as she watched Lena slip from stall to stall under the wide metal canopy decorated with red and gold banners, she realized that they were keeping an eye on Ms. Kent as well.

 

The people in the crowd glancing between the two of them were numerous and telling. Lena had explained after they'd parked in the town square that a wide variety of townies were converged on the market today, as was expected bi-weekly when the Amish arrived from the country to unload their crops and crafts. A sprawling make-shift bazaar with a diverse selection of goods transformed the brick lot into a bustling, for Smallville anyway, hub of activity. Locals were inviting, jovial and most of them knew Lena by name and exchanged pleasantries like old friends with her as she explored layouts of small animals hand-carved from wood or shimmering, colorful knickknacks made of blown glass.

 

On the surface, the scene was rustic and affable, but thanks to her hearing, Kara could pick up on the whispers as the crowd noticed Lena and her “friend from out-of-town,” as Kara had been introduced when a portly woman selling melons had faux-casually asked Lena about her. It seemed that her hostess had a reputation for the enigmatic and gossip-worthy which preceded her. A man and a woman hawking apples four stalls down had their attention drawn to Kara and her escort, speaking quietly about them.

 

_“Who’s that with the Kent girl? Pretty thing. Tall. Looks like she got money, too - you seen that car?”_

 

_“I dunno. Could be, you know... Well, I told you about Lena, she went to school with Jennifer. She's a sweetheart, but she's that one ain't never got no boys around her.”_

 

_“Oh, that's right, that was Martha’s daughter wasn't it? I'll be damned. But hell, less worries for her mama. Wish Jennifer had thought of that before she got with that low-life father of our grandchildren.”_

 

_“Don't start, Joe, after all that you got up to at that age…”_

 

Somehow, Kara wasn't surprised at Lena's reputation for lacking an affinity for the boys in town. There was just something about Lena’s mannerisms, the way she carried herself, the quirk of her lips, sparkle in her eye… She was relieved that she hadn't been imagining things or, Rao give her strength, thinking wishfully. Not that Lena had been coming on to her anyway. It was just… nice. To know that there was more common ground than Kara would have expected between the scion of an ambiguously evil empire and a salt-of-the-earth farmer’s daughter. Adapting to life on Earth and the mind-boggling options concerning relationships had challenged her Kryptonian upbringing in an aching, painful stretch akin to a spiritual growth-spurt.

 

With the combination of the laissez-faire neglect of the Luthors and the ever present, unfailing support of her brother and her best friend, she'd been lucky enough to experience a few meaningful but fleeting romantic bonds with boys and girls through the years. It helped that Alex embarked on a similar journey right alongside her, and Eliza and Jeremiah offered nothing but enthusiasm for each connection that she forged on her new planet. Plus, Lex had once struggled with coming-to-terms with himself when he was a young man, and as consequence had already largely laid waste to the narrow-minded fortifications that previously stood guard in the Luthor household over such bold self-realizations.

 

“She's an _alien_!” Lex had roared at Lillian and Lionel the day they discovered that Kara had invited a cute copygirl as her date to the company's Christmas party when she was eighteen. “You're really going to get ruffled by her sexuality when she can shoot freakin’ laser beams from her eyes?! Honestly, I’d hoped you’d gotten these drama queen tendencies out of your system the day you two walked in on me in the pool with the son of your oil tycoon friend when I was sixteen.”

 

Heartsick. Heartsick was the word for the emotion that flooded through her at the possibility of Lex being involved in the Luthor machinations aimed towards, at the very least, weakening her. Had he been afraid of her when he picked her up from middle school, daring her classmates to give her a hard time for being the weird kid? Was she misreading the trust they'd built as siblings those times he’d confessed to things like fantasizing about faking his death to escape their family's expectations? Could Lex have known that her adopted parents were lying when they'd presented Kal-El’s recovered belongings to her in a cardboard box and told her that she was the only Kryptonian to land safely on Earth?

 

“Kara?” Lena's voice, soft and concerned, broke through the tidal wave of grief and hurt threatening to sweep over her. “Are you okay?” A few feet ahead, she was observing Kara closely, worry drawing her brows together with a gigantic tomato in her hand.

 

The head of a woman with naturally bronzed skin, a high forehead and long, glossy black hair poked up from behind Lena. “Come over here, honey! You like tomatoes?”

 

Pure politeness moved Kara's feet to where the two women stood on either side of a tomato stand. “Sure,” she replied, strained and too distraught to fake a smile. “I like everything.”

 

The warm weight of Lena's hand settled on her back and her face dipped next to Kara’s shoulder, almost bumping it with her chin as she said under her breath, “I'm sorry about earlier. Are you alright? We can go back to the car if you need to - it's okay.”

 

Soothed by the frankly unnecessary amount of care exhibited across Lena’s features, Kara mustered a low chuckle. “No, I'm fine.” Lena only raised her eyebrows at what she knew to be less than the truth. “Really.”

 

“Ahem… That the one you want her to try, Lena?” The tomato lady, bearing witness to the entire exchange, finally spoke up after it appeared that Lena had forgotten about the sale she was in the middle of closing.

 

“Oh, yeah, sorry, Anna.” Awkwardly, Lena extricated herself from Kara and handed the tomato to the vendor. “You have to taste one of these tomatoes, Kara. There's something not right about them.”

 

Anna burst into laughter. “You've got some nerve, accusing my tomatoes of not being on the up-and-up just because you can't grow them right!” She proceeded to splash the tomato with bottled water and sliced a chunk of it off in her bare hand. Kara immediately accepted the piece offered to her from the tip of the knife.

 

“That's so good! It tastes like it's already been cooked,” said Kara between chewing.

 

Lena scoffed incredulously and pinned the seller with an exaggerated glare. “Right? How? That’s not just bonemeal! You're holding out on me, Anna!”

 

The woman shooed them away playfully. “I don't want to hear it! I told you exactly how we grow ours, and that's a family secret, Lena! You should be honored!”

 

Kara couldn't hold back her giggle at Lena's affronted expression. “Honored?! At the dishonesty, you mean?  _How_ are they so much better than ours?”

 

“Hey, don't knock ‘em ‘til your friend's tried ‘em!” called a man from two stalls over. He was light-skinned, dark haired with a cleft chin and wore nerdy, thick glasses that distracted from what might have been a conventionally handsome face. The barely concealed grin gave away that he was kidding around.

 

Lena, cackling, warm breath puffing in Kara’s ear, sidled up to her and slipped one arm through hers. “No! Don't buy from him! He overcharges!” Lena pretended to direct her away from the stand but inadvertently tucked her body closer to Kara's, who found herself at odds between going along with whatever the joke was and pulling away in the hopes that Lena wouldn't notice the outrageous flush that had developed across her skin.

 

“Wow, a little louder so that everybody hears and I have to start selling these in a fake mustache,” he muttered as they approached. The man’s face, open and friendly, held an indecipherable trace of tension that Kara wouldn't have recognized if she didn't wear the same expression so often herself. The fact that he was hiding something occurred to her instantaneously.

 

“Hm.” Kara peered at him and then down at the produce. “Seems reasonably priced to me. Granted, I'm a…” She silenced herself before the word Luthor crossed her lips. No reason to blow that whistle, when so many people still had their eyes glued to the two of them. Including the man before her, who had yet to turn his attention from her since initially calling them over.

 

“Don’t pay him a cent. This is _our_ family produce that he's selling. Meet Kara,” said Lena, nodding to her with a slight note of pride that intensified Kara's blush. “Kara, this is my cousin.”

 

The man gave Kara a thumbs up.

 

Lena rolled her eyes fondly. “Clark Kent.”

 

-

 

“Are you sure? It doesn't make any sense. How can something like that happen?” A man in his late thirties paced in agitation, one hand pinching the bridge of his nose and the other gesturing wildly with every sentence. The city of Metropolis and the interconnected lives inhabiting it extended all around him, a familiar stranger sixty stories beneath his office window.

 

_“We’re sorry, sir. Some answers are beyond the scope of science.”_

 

The hand on his nose shifted to the back of his head, which was smooth and cool in the recycled air. “I want a second opinion.”

 

There was a hushed exchange of voices on the other end of the speakerphone as the highest paid geneticists on LuthorCorp retainer conferred over how best to continue giving him the runaround. _“Mr. Luthor, we've already had the most qualified medical professionals with LuthorCorp security clearance submit results to you. I'm afraid that despite your state at the moment, there's nothing wrong with you and no further examination is required.”_

 

“Bullshit!” barked Lex Luthor at the speaker. “Find me someone else, then!”

 

_“Sir?”_

 

“Somebody who isn't on my family's payroll. I want the truth and I'm not going to find it through my parents’ lapdogs.” A second later, he added, “No offense.”

 

_“I - that is, well -”_

 

“I lied. Be offended. See how it feels, to be lied to?” From his peripheral vision, a photograph on his desk of an ecstatic blonde girl hugging a man dressed in a giant rabbit costume made him swallow down a fresh spike of shame and calmed the rage thundering in his skull long enough to think.

 

_“Mr. Luthor, perhaps your father can use his contacts to locate someone trustworthy.”_

 

“ _No._  Actually, nevermind. Forget I asked. Forget all of it.” The young woman beside his sister in the photo, dark haired and laughing her ass off at Kara and Bugs Bunny with his arms pinned helplessly to his sides, had his attention. “I know somebody. _Sort_ of.”

 

_“What? Who? We - we don't advise consulting sources that haven't been cleared by your security team, sir.”_

 

Lex tsked. “I'd imagine not. Best of luck informing my parents that you failed to string me along any further, doctor.” He ended the call before the snake could utter another word. In the next instant, he pressed a button to contact his receptionist.

 

_“Sir?”_

 

“I need you to cancel all of my engagements for the next week. And have them prepare the jet to leave in twenty minutes.” Lex downed the dregs of the glass of scotch languishing on his desk. An empty pill bottle lay on its side next to it, the name and number of the prescriber circled in heavy black ink.

 

_“And your destination, sir?”_

 

“National City.” He shrugged. “Then maybe Kansas.”

 

-

 

“Can you handle one last stop?” It had begun to get dark and sprinkle by the time Lena had left the Farmer's Market and her shady cousin, and it was full on raining once she'd retrieved the fuse she needed from the local hardware store, which thankfully carried umbrellas. That had taken a while, and Kara had gotten bored waiting for the gaping yokels and apparent fans of Lena to cease approaching her for car repair advice and general catching up. Standing off to the side trying to be invisible was as uncomfortable as being introduced as the now notorious “friend from out-of-town,” as Kara had discovered from beneath the curious gazes of every person in the store.

 

Lena had taken mercy on her when the assistant manager in his NASCAR ballcap cornered Kara and shot question after question about how she'd met Lena, how long she'd be in town and what the two of them had in common. Smoothly interrupting the interrogation, Lena had guided Kara out with an excuse about them missing dinner, an arm wrapped around her shoulders and a squeaky noise they both pretended Kara hadn't made.

 

Walking side-by-side under the umbrella with the light pattering of rain from above and no rush or obligation just for now had Kara feeling giddy. The night stroll down the emptied sidewalk and the cool breeze accompanying the steady beat of Lena's heart were all it took to stave off her troubles. Kara could admit that the wait in the shop had been worth it. And yes, of course, Alex was right about coming here. Where the hell else would she rather be right now?

 

“One more? Bring it on.” Kara smirked at Lena, face inches away beneath the umbrella that she held up like a shield against the outside world.

 

“Oooh, listen to _you_ ,” replied Lena, with an impish wink. “Right this way, m’lady.”

 

They ducked into a storefront a few yards up the street and Kara swatted at Lena's hands as she tried to help her close the umbrella when it gave her trouble. The sound of Lena's laughter echoing along main street lit Kara up inside and spread warmth through her chest like a match in a cave.

 

Her senses were overwhelmed with the scent of flowers of all types when she eventually followed Lena inside. Blooms of every color of the rainbow greeted her at the entrance and adorned every surface in sight, and most of the remainder. The shop was low-lit and she would have mistaken it for closed were it not for her enhanced vision picking up two female forms in the back of the shop.

 

“Lena?”

 

“We're back here! Just a second!”

 

_“Tulips as usual, then?”_ asked an unfamiliar voice of a woman. Kara scanned through the wall of the shop separating the display area from inventory and spied a strikingly pretty brunette probably ten years her senior, who was beholding Lena affectionately as she handed her a bundle of red, long-stemmed flowers wrapped loosely in paper. _“I love how you're always so good to your mom. It’s incredibly sweet.”_

 

Lena ran a hand through her hair.  _“Bah. She's better to me."_ She went shy, brushing off the compliment.

 

Suddenly irritated, Kara tuned out the rest of the conversation and focused instead on an arrangement of white flowers in a swirling opaque vase on the counter. The more she stared the more familiar they became, and a bout of tremulous nostalgia overtook her.

 

_“What are they?” asked Kara, watching her mother trace billowy shapes with her finger across the holographic display, circling around one another and spanning wider as she continued. The projection spread them about the council room, suspended above their heads._

 

_“I don't really know. I've drawn them since I was a girl. Something like flowers, I suppose.”_

 

_“Flowers?” One after another, they faded into existence throughout the air, floating and unfolding around them. “They're beautiful.”_

 

_“You think so? Help me, then, love. What color should we make them?”_

 

_“...White.”_

 

“Plumerias, eh? You have good taste. All flowers have special meaning.” The woman from the back room approached her from the shadows, her face a bit younger, sadder up close.

 

“Kara, this is Lana,” announced Lena, walking in right behind her and returning to Kara's side, cradling the tulips. “Lana, meet-”

 

“Kara, your friend from out-of-town,” she intoned as if repeating a mantra, grinning at them both. “You're the talk of the town, you know. Fair warning.”

 

“Can't say I blame them.” And Kara internally burst into flames when Lena's eyes raked over her from top to bottom. “The plumerias as well, if you don't mind,” Lena requested pointing to the vase.

 

Embarrassed, Kara waved Lana away from the flowers. “Oh, no, you don't have to do that.”

 

“Why not? You like them, don't you?” Lena tilted her head scoldingly, and plucked one out of the vase to examine it, shaking off the water. “Besides, I like them, too.”

 

And as if it was nothing, as if she did it everyday, Lena tucked the flower gently behind Kara's left ear and with the satisfaction of the Cheshire Cat himself, surveyed her work and purred, “ _Gorgeous_.”

 

Kara knew that her mouth was hanging open but she could not summon the wherewithal to close it.

 

“I'll, uh, throw in the vase for free. I think they just may be meant to be together,” said Lana, eyes filled with mischief as she slid the flowers to Kara, and Lena placed a few bills on the counter. “Thank you for your patronage, Ms. Kent.”

 

“And thank _you_ , Ms. Lang.”

 

“It was nice meeting you, Kara. I hope to see more of you,” Lana, an elfin twinkle to her smile, said as way of goodbye.

 

“Um. Yeah. Bye.”

 

She spun around to follow Lena out, who retrieved their umbrella drying by the door. When Lena swung open the entrance, the wind almost blew it back at them.

 

“Weather's moody again.” Lena carried the umbrella in one hand and the tulips in the other, holding it at an angle while the rain nearly flew at them sideways. Both of their phones went off simultaneously. “Severe storm warning, right on cue, I'm sure.”

 

“Should we be worried?” Kara practically had to shout to be heard over the downpour.

 

“Let's just hurry. I’m more worried my mom will try to come check on us in the truck.”

 

They walked briskly back to Kara's vehicle, huddled together and at various points grasping each other's hands over the umbrella handle when it tried to blow away. Finally reaching the BMW, clothes soaked through and shoes squelching, they launched themselves into the car and Kara jacked the heat up to max, watching Lena shiver.

 

“Well, that was fun!” Lena exclaimed, hugging herself with the tulips spread across her lap, completely sincere.

 

“Yeah. Heck of an ending.” Kara placed the vase of plumerias in a cup holder, where they fit perfectly in a serendipitous turn of events, and pulled on to main street and then out onto the highway.

 

The darkness and pounding flurry assaulting their exterior served to make the return trip more menacing than even the frosty silence that had ridden with them into Smallville.

 

“Can you see alright?” Lena asked at one point, squinting somewhat anxiously at the windshield.

 

“Yeah, I'm good. I have really great vision,” she responded truthfully, amused by Lena bobbing round trying to see the road through the rain. “Like, freakishly great.”

 

“I’m glad. I can't see a thing, but I think the roadsides are flooded.” Her laugh was nervous, though she tried to hide it. “This is actually kind of bad.”

 

They'd driven for half an hour and had returned six panicked texts from Martha when the first lightning strike tore open the sky and in a flash revealed that the surrounding fields were a black ocean of rainwater that was steadily encroaching on the road.

 

Kara had already known. Lena hadn't.

 

“I don't want to scare you, Kara, but I'm not sure if the road will hold out all the way to the house,” Lena suggested, her whole body screaming of suppressed terror.

 

“We'll be okay.” Kara had already mulled it over. If the path ahead became too treacherous, worst case scenario, she would call in a chopper to pick them up from the nearest airport. They could sit and wait safely in the car to be airlifted back to Kent farm. A little flashy for her taste, but her humility meant nothing if she couldn’t keep Lena safe.

 

Lena’s eyes reflected the lights cast from the stereo eerily as she assessed Kara in the dark. “You seem quite confident of that.”

 

“I can be surprisingly confident, once you get to know me.” And damn it, she didn't care if it came off as flirting, even if that hadn't been her intent. She liked Lena. Lena was smart and sweet and sexy and right now she was doing her best to be brave and conceal how frightened for her life she was in an effort to not frighten Kara and it only made her like her more. There weren't many things that Kara could be entirely confident of on this planet, especially lately, but the unshakable certainty of being the safest person to be around in times of danger was one of them. “I was serious when I said that I wouldn't let anything happen to you. And I won't.”

 

“My hero,” breathed Lena, a whit of her humor restored by Kara's earnestness.

 

Shaking her head to hide the smile edging over her face, Kara motioned with one hand to the stereo. “How about some music to calm you down? The quiet is creeping me out. It's got satellite, so-”

 

Lena was pressing buttons and had navigated rapidly to her playlists as if she were the one who made them. “Oh, good god, Kara. Is this… is this N’sync on here?”

 

“What?! No, it's random!”

 

“There's… there's so much of it.”

 

“It's probably some playlist generating algorithm gone wonky, don't ask me.”

 

“It's called _My_   _Road Trip Mix 2,_ Kara. You are on a road trip. It's suspicious.”

 

“I don't know, it came with the car!”

 

“Fairly sure there's not a car on the market that comes stock with such mortifying taste in music.”

 

“It's not that bad!” The ruse exposed, Kara erupted into laughter. “They were the sound of a generation!”

 

“Sound of a generation doing what? Relieving themselves?” Lena was grinning wickedly now, enjoying teasing her way too much.

 

“That is - that's so untrue and so _mean_!”

 

A crash of lightning cast the river overflowing the road ahead of them in vivid daylight. The giggle died in Kara's throat as she eased down on the break just slow enough to prevent Lena from getting whiplash.

 

“Roll down your window!” shouted Lena.

 

Kara reached for her phone. “Hang on, I've gotta call-” Water, freezing cold and rising swiftly enough to alarm her swept into the floorboard and reached her calves within seconds.

 

“Kara, my side is about to pull us under! We've got to roll down the windows so we can swim out!” Horror like she'd never heard in Lena's voice rang clear but as soon as the words left her mouth, the vehicle jerked to the right and they were submerged.

 

The rushing current spun them sideways once, twice, both of them screaming as the car filled with water. The world was black all around, and Kara could only catch glimpses of the moon and the bottom of the unanticipated lake engulfing them. Lena was coughing, choking, _drowning_ right beside her and something in Kara snapped. She wasn't going to go through this again, not ever. Over her dead body would she lose Lena like this.

 

She unbuckled and reached over Lena, a twisting form of limbs and undulating dark hair, to tear her seatbelt straight from the socket. Propelling herself through the confusing motion of the car and the water shoving against one another, Kara was able to clutch Lena tightly around the waist. In a benevolent act of fate, Lena was coherent enough to wrap her arms around Kara's neck. Maybe because she believed Kara when she'd said that she would protect her; maybe because if they had to die together beneath the waves, it was better to do so in each other’s arms.

 

If she didn't get them out of this, Kara would never know.

 

Maneuvering so that her feet pressed against the passenger door, Kara pulled Lena closely to her chest, tucked her head under her chin and bent her knees, one fist aimed at the driverside door, waiting for the right second. The moon flickered across her line of sight, and Kara pushed herself as hard as she could.

 

Her strength shot them through the sunken car, punching through the metal door, through the crushing pressure pinning them in, through the bleak, deep ocean of death that swallowed them and, finally with a triumphant explosion of rainwater, through to the surface and up, up, and away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know what you're thinking - How the hell can Anna grow such amazing tomatoes? It's not just bonemeal, that's some homebrew Miracle Grow at work. Annnyway, thanks for reading and feel free to let me know what you think. Stay safe, fam.


	7. Chapter 7

_Twelve years ago_

 

_The security agent pushing his chair kept running the wheels over cracks in the asphalt of the roof and jostling him but Lex was too exhausted to complain. The flight had taken a toll on him, and it was bad enough that his crisp white dress shirt was stained with a crimson line down the front from when the turbulence kicked in. His mother would close her eyes and turn away from him when the nosebleeds began, and Lex could hardly blame her. Ashen, weak, mottled with bruises and weighing half of what he had only a year ago, it was difficult enough for him to look at himself in the mirror._

 

_Alexander, barely twenty seven and bereft of the glory of all those rock musicians gone before him. The dream of their only son ruling the world someday and bringing pride to the Luthor name was dead. All that would remain in a few months was a memory of this sickly afterimage of him, wheezing and tired and so, so sorry he hadn't done what he'd wanted with his life when he still had time. Fortunately, today wasn't about him or the doctors and their needles and their treatments and their pills._

 

_I am dying with the help of too many physicians, he thought ruefully._

 

_The wind whipped up as the LuthorCorp paramilitary chopper descended onto the helipad stationed on the raised platform around which he, his mother and their security detail were gathered. Lillian Luthor didn't flinch and even her hair, strawberry blonde and pulled into a long high ponytail, only rustled lightly. An unflappable woman, intimidating in height and even more so in demeanor - his father claimed that the moment they’d met, he had known that she was destined to be a Luthor._

 

_“Steady on, Lex?” she asked him, towering above with her eyes shadowed by the early morning sunlight at her back. He nodded and shifted his gaze to the helicopter and the passengers about to embark from it. Two thirds of the family line, soon._

 

_After all of the convincing it took for his mother to allow him to leave their medical ward and accompany her to their penthouse in Metropolis to be a part of the welcoming committee, he wouldn't sour the experience with regrets of a dying man. As his father reported from the airbase, it was to be a day of miracles. The first, that a being from the stars had landed on Earth without the desire to capitalize on their flaws and foibles and subjugate mankind. The second, that he was to gain a little sister. Lex alone considered a third: that perhaps there was still a way to stop his family from mercilessly exploiting a world in which they no longer held any investment once he was buried._

 

_And her name was Kara Zor-El._

 

_The surreality of his parents opening their hearts to some endangered species orphan was only eclipsed by the knowledge that she was also an extraterrestrial. Which was unusual, but he’d heard of stranger things over the years in hushed conversations behind closed LuthorCorp office doors. His parents providing her with a suitable home without an agenda was an absurdity unworthy of consideration. And so he would combat their sadistic scheme with an equally preposterous one of his own._

 

_He would love her. And when he was gone, they would be forced to see it, to see him alive and well in her defiance of their control and her faith in herself. Much in the vein of an eldritch horror, the only validation that the Luthor name had to offer Kara was the certainty that her role in the universe was malignant at best and superfluous if she were lucky. He would dedicate his remaining moments, hours, months to helping her love this planet. And if this truly was a miraculous day… maybe his parents could learn to love her back._

 

_“Everyone, I would like for you to meet our new favorite little Luthor, Kara!”_

 

_His father swung open the door of the helicopter and out stepped a young woman in white, the age of a junior high student, who cast her stare all around and latched her hand on to Lionel's as he exited close behind her._

 

_A faint, discontented sigh emerged from his mother at his side when Kara spotted them and her lips curved upward bashfully. The hesitation in Kara’s steps down the platform stairs and towards them betrayed her apprehension at embracing a new life, new identity and a new family._

 

_Kara halted before them. His father stood behind her with his arms clasped behind his back and eyes downcast in mock humility, presenting her to them as if she were a gift. Or a sacrifice._

 

_“H-hello. I'm Kara.”_

 

_“Hi… Kara.” Barely a word and he was already losing his breath. Head lulling back in his chair, Lex summoned the last drops in his reservoir of strength to reach his hand out to her, but even then he fell short and it hung in the air._

 

_Kara’s hand closed the gap and she laced her fingers through his. “You must be Lex. It's nice to meet you. I… I've never had a brother before.”_

 

_He could barely hold his eyes open but he'd be damned if she didn't get the reception she deserved. “So… nice,” he confirmed, flashing his teeth._

 

_“Yes,” interrupted Lillian, “so perhaps you should go inside and we can disperse this rooftop party? Welcome, Kara. I'm sure that my husband will see to it that you're settled in.”_

 

_Still clinging to Lex’s hand, Kara shook her head in confusion and an edge of panic crept into her voice. “But I thought that we were going to go get my cousin after this?”_

 

_Lillian crouched down to meet Kara's eyes. Lex had never seen his mother lower herself for anyone, not even in memories of his own childhood. “You've already shown our people how to locate Kryptonian vessels with your pod. We've found him. I’m leaving right now to personally retrieve him and bring him to you. The best way for you to help him is to begin priming for life on Earth, since you'll both be staying here for the foreseeable future.”_

 

_Kara glanced uncertainly back to Lionel. He nodded sagely down at her. “She's right, sweetheart. You leave it to us. That's what family means.”_

 

_Lillian cocked her head at the man standing behind him, and Lex felt his chair begin to swerve to face the elevator they had arrived on. Kara stuck close by him, still holding his hand, keeping step with the chair the whole time._

 

_There were tears in her eyes, but her face was set with the resigned knowledge that she was doing the best she could the only way she knew how._

 

_“Okay… Kara?”_

 

_Kara sniffled, and returned a sad half smile to his inquiry. “It's okay, Lex.”_

 

_She squeezed his hand delicately, a girl both suppressing her strength and drawing on it to its full extent at the same time, and in that moment he swore to himself that she would never walk through this world feeling alone._

 

It occurred to Lex Luthor, years later, scrolling through photos of him with his sister on his phone in the back of a town car, that his biggest regret may yet be miraculously surviving leukemia. How ironic that his near doom was to be one of the heartstring tugging platforms of his future campaign. Had he died, he wouldn't have lived long enough to break every vow he'd ever made.

 

-

 

Lena was coughing, her chest heaving violently, but Kara could hear her lungs clearly inhaling and exhaling, which was a good sign. Kara shifted her closer, close enough to feel some of the chill in her body bleed away and be replaced by Kara's own warmth. She rose high above the spontaneous lake consuming her BMW, gripping Lena tightly around her back and behind her knees just in case the rainfall dowsing them tried to slide her out of Kara's arms. It was fortunate that the storm decided to pelt her primarily from behind, allowing a semblance of relief from the barrage. The sky was black but she peered around and spied the far off porch lights of the Kent Farm through the deluge.

 

She hadn't flown in over a decade and adrenaline coursed through her, sharpening her senses and chipping away at something deep inside encased in ice.

 

“Kara?” Lena had come around enough to fist one hand in the collar of Kara's blazer, her coughing largely subsided. “What’s… what's happening?” She pushed her heavy, rain slicked hair away from her eyes and jolted when she realized they they were in the midst of the torrent, floating above the ground.

 

_You're dreaming. You're hallucinating. We're being propelled by gas pockets from beneath the shifting surface of the earth. Golly, I don't know either!_

 

Lena, radiating wonder and gratitude, was too clever to fall for her impromptu excuses and frankly, Kara didn't want to lie to her. Couldn't if she tried, with the way she was looking at her. Rain droplets landed lightly on Lena's skin, her eyes reflecting the moonlight as she slid her hand up Kara's neck and cupped her jaw, thumb stroking her cheek and her fingertips brushing smoothly against the spot just beneath her ear.

 

“You can fly?” murmured Lena, more an awestruck statement than a question. An aborted glance below their suspended bodies resulted in her squeezing closer to Kara, who wobbled slightly as they soared toward Hickory Lane.

 

“I kinda had to.” Honestly, she was almost disappointed with how well Lena was handling this. So much of her life was spent navigating around her alien abilities yet when she revealed them to somebody, they didn't even display the pageantry to scream and run away. Or scream, at least. Hyperventilation seemed an appropriate response. If their roles were reversed, Kara knew she'd be wailing loud enough for Martha to hear a mile away. “You don't seem to mind.”

 

“You saved my life,” Lena responded, her voice husky. “Either that, or my brain is exploiting its own death spasms to spoil me rotten.”

 

“Oh, this is real. Promise.”

 

Skating her hand from Kara's jaw to the nape of her neck, Lena summoned the courage to survey their altitude. “It's funny; when I fly in my dreams it's a nightmare. But now…”

 

“I guess you can't top the real thing.” Kara was kicking herself mentally before she'd finished the sentence. “You know what I mean. Is this your first time?  _Flying_?” Was she accidentally flirting with Lena, or was it that her capability to think pure thoughts became totally compromised around her?

 

An unfamiliar apprehension crossed Lena's face and she turned towards the night a moment before responding. “Tend to have bad luck with it. But you aren't wrong about this being superior.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

Lena felt so comfortable, so _right_ in her arms, clothing saturated to the point of serving as little more than a thin, heated barrier between them, and it occurred to her that if she were to dip her head right now, she might be kissing Lena Kent. Her fixed gaze on her lips, and then flicker to Kara's eyes convinced her that Lena sensed the same current of energy that threatened to pull them together.

 

She wasn’t sure that it was fair to Lena to dive in when things between them were quite literally in the air, her secrets only barely past the threshold of whatever enchantment was steady drawing in around them. “You're taking it pretty well. I'm impressed.” Kara tipped her chin at the yellow outdoor bug lights on the horizon. “Almost home.”

 

The moment broken, Lena shifted her contemplation away from the threads in Kara's neck and closed her eyes as she leaned her head against Kara's throat, breath hot on her collarbone. “I'm not so easily impressed, myself, once you get to know me.” Her chuckle reverberated pleasantly against Kara's chest.

 

As she neared the final stretch of road that would lead to the farm, she noticed that the lot appeared to be merely soggy, positioned uphill from the flooding. A compact metal helicopter containing a rather annoyed pilot, judging by his muttering, sat on the lawn, twenty yards from the driveway. How she'd missed that in her pre-cursory scan of the area, she could only guess. Well, she had few solid guesses, one hand splayed over the side of Lena's ribs, knowing that if her fingers climbed any higher she would effectively be cupping the woman’s breast.

 

Kara softly descended to the gravel road, carefully remaining outside the line of sight of their mystery guest. The water hadn't risen close to the house but the street still crunched wetly when her toes touched ground. For a few seconds, she and Lena simply searched one another's faces, both a bit shaken by all that had transpired.

 

“Sorry I forgot to grab any of our stuff. I went into panic mode. Do you think you're able to walk? I’d be fine with carrying you but someone might ask questi-”

 

“Kara, put me down,” ordered Lena, an eyebrow arched and a hue paler than usual but feeling well enough to give her a grin.

 

“Right. Yeah. There we go,” she whispered, lowering Lena's legs to the road with the care and attention of a zookeeper introducing a baby giraffe to its new environment.

 

Plainly amused, Lena brushed herself off once she was on her feet, her shirt sticking in places that prompted Kara to maintain a one-thousand yard stare over the top of Lena's head. “Thank you. Look, Kara, I don’t know what you’d prefer I share with anybody who asks about what happened, if anything at all.” She chanced an appraisal of the house up the street and the helicopter nearby. “And if you don't want to talk about it, I understand; trust me. But just know, your secret is safe with my family. ”

 

Before she could respond, Kara caught the rustle of the front room curtains in the window and Martha Kent peeped out at them through the blinds. Kara listened for voices while scanning the house, and picked up three figures. Martha, a bald man pacing under the doorframe to the kitchen, and another woman, dressed sharp and tapping one foot impatiently as she stood behind Martha.

 

_“I think I see them down the road!”_

 

_“One can hope,”_ said the woman, sounding bored and looking fed up.

 

_“Thank God,”_ exclaimed the man, who leaned against the wall in relief.

 

Kara motioned to Lena to accompany her up the driveway and finally approach the house in the open. “They've spotted us; we may as well face the music.”

 

“Who? How do you know?”

 

The front door burst open and Martha Kent ran down the steps to meet them as they strolled along the driveway. She threw her arms first around Lena, and then a surprised Kara, before grasping both of their wrists and glaring at them.

 

“I have been calling for the last ten minutes straight! What's happened to you girls? Did you walk? Where's your car, Ms. Luthor? Are you two alright?!”

 

After exchanging a clandestine look with Kara that established that they would continue this conversation another time, Lena slid an arm around her mother and directed her back to the porch.

 

“You're going to catch pneumonia, mom! What were you thinking, coming out here with no jacket and no umbrella?” As an absolutely apocalyptic scowl formed across Martha's features, Lena began snickering and bumped Kara's shoulder with her own.

 

“It's not funny, Lena, do you have any idea how scared I've been all evening?”

 

“I do,” chirped a voice from the porch, safely under the awning and protected from the rain. “And parsing through _that_ hysteria, I now know more about rural weather patterns than a slack-jawed mail carrier. Evidently for naught, as your storm chasers appear hardly the worse for wear.”

 

“I can grab towels, if you can tell me where to find them, Mrs. Kent.” The man stood in the doorway holding the screen open, waiting for them.

 

Kara vaguely recognized the woman, who likely numbered around fifty in age, her hands on her hips and staring Kara down as she followed the Kents to their home.

 

“Who are these people, mom?” Lena asked, not bothering to lower her voice and instinctively suspicious of their strange visitors.

 

The woman, shoulder length blonde hair having lost some of its curl from the humidity, waved an arm haughtily at the tall, dark and handsome man behind her. “This is the chief photographer for CatCo Magazine, James Olsen. And I,” she indicated herself with a fanciful swish of her fingers, “am the founder and CEO of CatCo Worldwide Media, come to warn you of the very _exotic_ breed of storm that could be heading your way.”

 

“ _Cat Grant_?” It finally clicked into place just who she was seeing. “What are you _doing_ here?” Kara asked, genuinely dumbfounded that the only woman her adoptive mother actively avoided at social functions was on the same farm as her in the middle of nowhere.

 

“Well, I _was_ here to personally inform this innocent family that they're on route to becoming one more bloodstain on the tapestry of the Luthor rise to power.” There was a battle-weariness behind her eyes that clashed with her otherwise self-confident manner. “But from the looks of the company they're keeping, I'm too late.”

 

“Excuse me?” Lena was suddenly in front of her mother and Kara and reverting to the frosty exterior Kara recalled from their first meeting. “I don't know who you think you-”

 

“The Luthors, young lady. With the Nevada site gone public, your family qualifies as a _loose end_ , and that's not an exclusive club of which you want to be a member.” Cat sighed, glanced at James over her shoulder, braced herself against the railing and divulged, a tad remorsefully, “Just ask your father.”

 

-

 

He thought he would never see the day when the cold storage of Thoral Airbase was at capacity, but the shipment from the test site had filled the facility to bursting with dead aliens. Hank Henshaw strode down the white hallway flanked by two labcoats pushing carts large enough to hold a prone human body, but no such luck. Two long, smooth black oblong shapes resembling coffins and serving as such were on their way to the max clearance containment area.

 

For whatever reason, the Luthors decided that all of the spare parts of one particular alien breed deserved special treatment. The containers, of alien material and construct, were nicked and scuffed but intact and packed with extraterrestrial remains. A couple of the only things to have survived the blasts and Lionel called in the “suggestion” to lock them up instead of melting them down to build into weapons like they were doing with the rocks in their Midwestern facility. Wasteful.

 

But he'd finally gotten his clearance upped to deliver them to their final resting spot and while Henshaw wasn't an excitable person, it would be fun to shake out more of the Luthors’ dirty laundry. Beyond the massive airlocked metal doors before him was the trump card of Project Cadmus and their entire operation. It had only taken him years of eating LuthorCorp’s shit to see it.

 

What would Harper say if he could see him now? Jim hadn't been much more than a snot-nosed punk when they enlisted, not that he could claim to be any wiser, thinking he was invincible and acting accordingly. If he could go back in time, his younger self probably wouldn't believe that it was Jim, and not him who would bite off more than he could chew. There were very few times where Hank found himself feeling good about working with the Luthors. Remembering Jim Harper, his best friend, and the way his mother collapsed on her doorstep when he informed her that her son was M.I.A. was one of them. Protecting this planet from otherworldly threats might be tangential to the Luthors, but for Hank it had become a higher calling. It was all worth it.

 

“Just shove them in and be on your way, gentlemen, if you value your lives,” he commanded the scientists. “And then one of you contact Mrs. Luthor and tell her I asked about her progress on obtaining that civilian asset of hers she's been grooming. We're short on time and I can't be the only one doing my part this late in the game.”

 

Goddamn, it felt good to speak his mind, knowing that he was the most essential person on the premises. Agent Henshaw punched the code in the keypad, pressed his a hand on the wall panel, submitted to a retina scan and stepped back as the doors decompressed with a dramatic whoosh and slid open.

 

Both carts screeched past on either side of him and collided loudly with two heavy steel lab desks situated near the entrance.

 

“Are you kidding me?” The pounding of the scientists’ feet on the vinyl floor echoed down the hall as they made their terrified retreat before they saw anything that would definitely get them killed. “Maybe you boys should have gone out for track instead of math club, eh?” he shouted after them.

 

The room was smaller than he expected. As he circled one of the desks, the doors closed behind him with a beep. If he happened to forget the keycode to exit, he would likely die in this room.

 

“Alone at last.”

 

Metal vaults lined the walls like the inside of a post office and two of the spacious vaults on the bottom would soon be the new homes of the alien boxes. Monitors were hung along the rim of the ceiling and little lights of uncertain origin blinked from all around.

 

A portion of the white ceiling was depressed by half an inch, framed by a metallic seal in the shape of a square.

 

“A trap door in the ceiling? You people have “doing things backward” down to a science.” Luthor probably had the remote to open it wired into one of his teeth, the paranoid son of a bitch. What could be more damning than what he already had access to in this room?

 

Directly across from him, built into the wall and fit snugly between the columns of vault doors, were two upright tubes with backlit fiberglass windows. Inside the chamber on the left was the body of a woman who had once been very beautiful and was now quite deceased. Drawn with marker on the side was a small circle with a line crossing through it horizontally, and no indications of her identity.

 

“Jesus. _Christ_ ,” he breathed, staring at the chamber to the right. On the other side of the glass was the tiny body of a young male infant, sallow-skinned under the artificial light. He appeared emaciated and black, thick, curly hair tickled his eyes, closed tight in the sleep of the dead.

 

“Guess somebody in that family might have a soul after all. At least they named you...”

 

A fiberglass nameplate attached to the chamber beneath the window was etched with a simple label for the creature inside.

  
“...Kal-El.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year! And thanks for all of the love for last chapter, plus there were some great questions :I But thank you for reading and feel free to share your thoughts, whatever they may be. Congrats everybody for making it through 2016!


	8. Chapter 8

Kara huddled in a line on the sofa with Lena beside her resting her head on her mom’s shoulder and the three of them smothered in a cocoon of blankets. Cat Grant, who possessed the uncanny prowess to alter the energy of a space to suit her needs regardless of how out of place she may be, reclined in the floral print armchair. Her associate, James Olsen, had pulled up a rocking chair from across the room after stoking the fireplace hot enough to rival the Fire Falls on Krypton.

 

But it wasn't the heat making Kara's blood burn.

 

Lena's dad. _Lena's_ _dad_. How in the hell did her parents manage to destroy this family from so far away? Seven billion people on this planet and Kara found herself attached to one with every reason to hate her. Just how many families like the Kents had stories that ended the same way?

 

Martha Kent would not look at her. A tray of lemon squares lay untouched on the coffee table. Kara guiltily acknowledged that they’d been baked with her in mind while she spent the afternoon flitting around with Mrs. Kent’s daughter in Smallville. It seemed absurd, now, that she had been allowed in the door; that they tolerated her presence at all. There was no fixing this and her role in it was undeniable. Deep down, Kara had known that there would be a price for surviving on Earth, and she had allowed others to pay it.  _How many?_

 

As James Olsen explained what CatCo had discovered with the sensitivity of a licensed therapist, both Martha and Lena grew despondent. Years of doubts and concerns about her family that Kara had exiled to a vast internal tomb sprung loose and snapped at her conscience with the ferocity of starved predators. Tears rolled freely down Martha and Lena's faces. Kara wanted to scream.

 

It began when the father of a “very close friend” of Mr. Olsen (Ms. Grant rolled her eyes at his description of who was clearly an ex) contacted him via email. A well-connected bureaucrat and soldier, General Sam Lane of the U.S. Army tipped off James with info on the testing site, referred to as a _landing_ site in his email, when the footage of the grave went mainstream.

 

Twelve years ago, LuthorCorp chanced upon a bizarre interplanetary vessel after it landed in the Nevada desert, months before the U.S. government would have otherwise picked it up on their own surveillance. Rumor had it that something similar was discovered in California only a few days previous to this, and LuthorCorp volunteered for outsourcing duty on that as well, but the General couldn’t confirm it. After LuthorCorp informed the military of the crash, a partnership was quickly brokered when the government began to investigate the perimeter of the Nevada location and found that they were outmatched technologically. The best they could hope for was to reverse-engineer the cloaking shield of the vessel and simply conceal it from the public.

 

This was an unsatisfactory course of action in the opinion of Lionel Luthor, to put it mildly. He suggested, rather belligerently, that the military was mistaken to let sleeping dogs lie and that he would happily dispose of their invaders before they amassed enough resources to conquer and enslave mankind. The next day, LuthorCorp paramilitary returned with a team of mercenary troops, a modest cache of bright green minerals and a remote control for two 50 megaton nuclear warheads.

 

Afterwards, in an effort to at least appear useful, the military cloaked ground zero and assigned a federal agent named Hank Henshaw to oversee the site.

 

“Look, I can't exaggerate the distrust General Lane must have for LuthorCorp if he was worried enough to send that email to me, of all people. Guy once pressured me to accept a photojournalist position in Latveria. That’s not even a real country.” James was reeling over the situation, too. “He mentioned that there were more rocks like the ones on the video. That they're here in a LuthorCorp storage facility.”

 

“Thank you, James. Every time I hear you reiterate this story I'm relieved that your passion is photography and not the written word.” Cat smirked at him fondly to soften the blow.

 

“Honestly, Ms. Grant, I'm beginning to wonder if the visual medium is only good for internet memes anymore when a corporation has half the media in its back pocket,” said James darkly. Kara got the distinct impression that this issue was something he spent a significant amount of his time hashing out with himself.

 

“The refinery. You know about it?” Lena cut in, her tone sharp enough to carve diamond.  Her arms were wrapped around her mother, who was quietly sniffling with one shaking hand covering her eyes. Kara fidgeted next to them, profoundly uncomfortable.

 

“ _You_ know about it?” James shared a frustrated glance with Cat. “That is seriously dangerous information to have right now.”

 

“I'm sure you remember the night Mr. Kent had his fishing “accident?” The date is smack in the middle of the week that all of this took place.” Cat neglected to elaborate on what she knew about the true nature of LCEK. Maybe she thought the Kents were already privy to an overabundance of assassination-worthy info and didn't wish to add more fuel to the fire. Just as likely though, Kara figured, she didn't want to tip her hand when one of the potential accessories to murder was breathing the same oxygen.

 

She carried on, addressing the Kents directly. “Consider, did Jonathan Kent have a history of fishing at spots with no dock to cast his line from, which Wikipedia tells me is important? And did the police ever follow up on the sets of footprints near where they approximated Mr. Kent slipped and fell? How about the military vehicles a pair of hunters reported seeing by the riverbank that same day?”

 

“Are you trying to say that…” began Martha, her voice thick and almost slurred with emotion, “my husband saw something the Luthors were doing and they murdered him for it?”

 

Cat Grant nodded solemnly.

 

_“We're sorry, Kara. This was all that we recovered from your cousin’s pod. Something went wrong with his landing and he didn't make it. The company has handled the disposal of his remains, so it won't be necessary for you to perform whatever funeral rites your people observed. I’m afraid there's nothing more anyone could have done.”_

 

_Lillian pressed a box into her arms and Kara fell to her knees in the middle of the Luthors’ exquisitely furnished study._

 

_Ignoring the drama playing out behind him, Lionel presented his son with a heart-sized chunk of meteor from his wife’s excavation. “Lex, your mother brought you a souvenir. It's a mineral from a distant star system called Rao, the same as Kara. Astounding, isn't it?”_

 

_“What in the hell is wrong with her?” Kara heard Lillian ask from the darkness, the woman's alarm lined with distaste as Kara collapsed and began to go into seizures at her feet._

 

_“Dad! The rock! Get it away!” Lex was the first to recognize her weakness, and she awoke hours later in her new bed, covered over by Kal-El’s red baby blanket, her new brother waiting at her bedside._

 

_Lex, hollow-eyed and the sickliest she would ever see him, informed her that both of her Earth parents had been whisked away on pressing business the moment she stabilized and that they were very sorry for her loss._

 

The Luthors were responsible for all of this. The deaths of other aliens, human beings and if Lex became President, what then, entire nations? When would it end? Kara was shaken, but anger awoke in her strong enough to make her eyes water. If only there was a deserving subject within swinging distance to unleash it on, besides herself. Since arriving on Earth, it was often a struggle for her to dispel or dismiss her rage once something pissed her off. On Krypton, she hadn't been that way.

 

But then, on Krypton she'd been named after the constellation prominent at the moment of her birth - _Kara_ , the ancient Pre-Raoist goddess of beauty. Putting stock in the old naming customs had been considered quirky of her parents, even tacky in the modern era, but her aunt Astra always said it suited her. Alternatively, the fake birthdate listed on her driver's license placed her life under the influence of a fixed star portending misery and ruin. Maybe those long dead Kryptonian and Earthling astronomers alike were onto something after all.

 

Ms. Grant’s blunt words to the Kents snapped Kara back to the present like a bucket of cold water over her head. “If we publish this story, people will seek your family out. Some of them will be journalists looking to scavenge for provocative headlines. Expect to live under a microscope and for conspiracy theorists to transform Smallville into a tourist trap again. The military will certainly want to question you and that's the best case scenario. And as for the Luthors,” Cat drawled, eyes locked on Kara, “a human face for the victims of their reign of terror isn't good press. They know this.”

 

“Kara won't hurt us.” Lena wasn't responding to Cat’s implication, she was speaking to Martha alone. There was something strange in the way she said it, the Kents’ expressions conveying more than the words she was saying. “She isn't like them.”

 

Martha stared at her daughter, then reached out of the blanket and smoothed her hair over temple, still damp from some peril of which Lena would never share the full extent. “Are you sure, sweetheart?”

 

“I trust her, mom.”

 

Even as she watched it happen, could read the compassion in Mrs. Kent’s eyes, Kara was still stunned when Martha reached across Lena and patted where Kara's hands were balled into one giant fist in her lap under the blanket. She lost it.

 

“ _I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I didn't know, I didn't know what to do_ ,” Kara confessed, partially intelligible between her gulps for air as she started to cry, her ribcage feeling like it was trying to crack open from inside her chest. “ _I_ _t’s so bad and I couldn't do anything, I'm so sorry._ ”

 

“Oh, honey!” Martha gasped, thrown by the reaction.

 

“Hey, is she alright? Ms. Grant, maybe we should go. I don't think we have all of the facts here.” James picked up the tray of lemon squares and mimed handing it to Kara, but redirected and ate two himself when Cat glared at him.

 

Lena bodily enveloped her, nestling Kara’s face against her throat, speaking softly to comfort her as she had done in the loft earlier that day. Seemed like forever ago, now.

 

“I’m okay,” croaked Kara, and she could feel Lena’s chin rubbing the back of her scalp as she shook her head no in response.

 

“Ms. Grant, Mr. Olsen. I want to thank you for coming all the way out here just to give us a chance to be prepared for the worst.” Mrs. Kent shook off the covers and headed towards the kitchen. She returned with a box of plastic wrap.

 

“You need to understand how much danger your family is in,” insisted Cat. “If you wish, James and I can help you find a safehouse until this blows over. Fair warning, it may or may not be in Canada, so there's a distinct possibility you won't ever see me again.”

 

“No,” Martha said immediately. “Let them come. I'm not giving the people responsible for this another inch. Now, Lena-”

 

“I can’t argue with you and do this at the same time, mom,” huffed Lena, indicating Kara bundled in her arms. “So how about we skip the part where you tell me to run and hide and wrap up those lemon squares for Mr. Olsen?”

 

James ceased his anxiety eating and dropped the block of pastry he’d been raising to his mouth on the tray. “Sorry. If there's anything I can do, let me know. I don't deal well with not being able to help,” he explained, embarrassed.

 

“Then share those with the pilot, please. Help me avoid hearing about his _food_ _headache_ the whole trip back to National City.” Cat Grant arose and pulled a business card from her purse. “And James had the right idea in coming here, futile as it was. I guarantee you your lives are about to become a great deal more interesting.”

 

Kara slowly extricated herself from Lena as James got up to leave as well. Martha took Cat's card and read it front and back. “Is this your personal number?”

 

“Yes, and I would appreciate if you didn't pass it around, Mrs. Kent. I don’t fancy cameoing in some redneck's YouTube video where he texts me asinine lyrics to Tim McGraw songs.”

 

James took his leave of the women on the sofa and gave a nod that bordered on an old school gentlemanly bow. “Don't forget that CatCo has got your back and don't be afraid to ask for help if you need it. ” He paid special attention to Kara, mostly recovered from her episode, by choosing his words with deliberation. “And best of luck with everything. Family's hard sometimes, but if we all have people who care…”

 

“We’re stronger together,” Kara finished for him, and the words hit her with a jolt. _El Mayarah._  The family motto and true meaning behind the House of El coat-of-arms. Stronger together. She hadn't thought of the phrase in years and repeating it felt like a missing piece of herself returned home.

 

“Let's hope so. How excellent would it be if someone with the clout of a Luthor were to behave as a force for good?” Cat proposed it like a challenge, appraising Kara with new eyes. “Your mother would spontaneously unclench out of shock, so make sure there's no one below her when the stick falls out.”

 

Lena and James both snickered, but Martha, in the spirit of hospitality towards Kara, hid her face and made short work of packaging the rest of the sweets and pressed them pointedly into James’ chest. “You two, please fly safe. There have been enough close calls in this weather for one night.”

 

“Hmph, even if that helicopter goes down, it won't be taking me with it,” affirmed Cat, with a pat on Martha’s arm as she brusquely passed on her way to the door. “I did not survive the rise and fall of UGG boots only to die in a country-fried hellscape where they're still considered fashionable, Mrs. Kent.”

 

“We’ll be in touch,” promised James. Martha stood on the porch while Cat Grant and James Olsen loaded into the Catcopter and ascended into the sky. She waited there until they were a speck beyond the rivulets falling in the distance. Kara could discern her breathing shakily as Mrs. Kent remained staring off into the storm.

 

“Mom? Are you alright?” Lena, who hadn't said a word since the CatCo team left, finally pulled herself away from gazing blankly at a photo of her father on the wall.

 

“Just a minute, hun.”

 

Her enhanced vision revealed Martha frantically wiping the fresh tears from under her eyes, and Kara realized her lifetime quota for watching the Kents in pain. “Lena, are _you_ alright?”

 

“I need some air, to get my head straight. Today has been ridiculously emotional and I’m drained. There’s just been...” She tapered off, shaking her head.

 

“It's been a lot.”

 

Lena blew a puff of laughter. “ _Yeah_.”

 

Having reached an acceptable disguise of her grief, Martha returned inside with a screech of the screen door. “Girls, it's late and I'm tapped out for the night,” she declared, apologetic in an automaton way. “You don't know how grateful I am that you're okay but I think that I may lose my mind if I don't sleep on this before it sets in.”

 

Martha, movement stilted, reached over the back of the sofa to hug Lena from behind and planted a kiss on her hair. “We'll get through this.”

 

When she released her daughter and shuffled to the stairs to head to bed, Lena twisted around and called out, raw and too loud, “I love you, mom!”

 

“I love you, baby,” her mother echoed immediately from the top of the steps.

 

Martha said nothing to Kara, which didn't escape Lena’s notice.

 

“It's not you, Kara.” Dark circles were already fully formed under Lena’s eyes but she attempted to be cheerful when she handed Kara the remote control. “Don't think for a second that you aren't welcome, okay? Just get something to eat, watch some TV, try and rest. I'll be in the barn if you need anything.”

 

“Okay,” was all that Kara could say. Lena grabbed an umbrella and headed out the door and towards the loft, a lonesome figure walking in the rain.

 

The mental white noise of exhaustion convinced her to take Lena's advice and make a sandwich while a rerun of an old Star Trek episode played in the living room. Being alone downstairs in the mellow ambiance of the Kent house allowed her to calm her mind and breathe. Her instinct to avoid taking liberties in someone else’s home had been dulled over the years between switching planets, having access to six vacation houses and Alex demanding she stop apologizing for using the icemaker every time she slept over at the Danvers residence. It was almost easy to pretend that this was normal, that this life could be her own and she belonged here.

 

Kara ate the sandwich, two apples and half of a second tray of lemon squares Mrs. Kent had stored in the fridge. Forty-five minutes of lounging on the couch recharged most of her emotional equilibrium. She waited until she heard Martha's breathing even out and sleep finally take mercy on her before she picked up an umbrella from behind the living room door and ventured outside. It was well after midnight by the time she reached the red barn with its hazy golden lights casting a warm glow against the drizzling night sky.

 

“May I come in?” Floating at the threshold of the barn window, Kara peered uncertainly down at Lena, who absent-mindedly waved her in. She was sitting cradled in the hammock, a battered old reference book reading “ _Natural Satellites of Our Solar System_ ” across the top of the pages laying open in her lap. Once Kara was on the dry wood floor of the loft, she dropped the umbrella in a chair and sidled next to Lena, leaning back on her elbows against the length of wooden railing beside the hammock.

 

After one last bout dueling her nerves, Kara launched into what she knew could blow up in her face, which made it her only option of salvaging a genuine bond with Lena. No more secrets - they only protected the wrong people. “When I was in the house, it occurred to me that if I don't want to wind up just another Luthor, I need to be truthful with myself. And that means being honest with you, too. I want to start over. With all of this. So… Hi. My name is Kara Zor-El. It's nice to meet you.”

 

With a bemused purse of her lips, Lena shook Kara's proffered hand in a formal, slightly dorky handshake. “Zor-El, huh? So you're adopted, too? I had a feeling.”

 

“Yeah, when I was twelve. There was a phony company newsletter about it and everything.” Kara blinked. “Wait, are you…?”

 

“Yes. I've been a Kent since I was four.” Lena’s hands fiddled with each other restlessly and she kept her eyes on the floor. “Before that, it was just my mother and I. She loved me, but, well. That didn't make her the most _ethical_ person. Before she had me, she did a lot of things she wasn't proud of. I don't remember much about her except that she died with regrets. My cousin, Clark, was the one who wound up placing me with the Kents a few months later. I'm lucky, and I know it.” She bashfully sneaked a glance at Kara after telling the story.

 

With a fluidity that impressed herself, Kara walked to the hammock and settled next to Lena, their feet skimming the floor side-by-side and swinging faintly.

 

“I didn't know, Lena. I’m sorry. I had no idea.”

 

Lena brushed her off with a self-effacing smile. “Call it a night of revelations. Would you like to talk about anything else, while we're on the subject?” Lena tipped her head, her expression open and encouraging.

 

Maybe she couldn't do this; she’d never had to do this herself before. The Luthors had prepped the Danvers and… no one else knew. “Look, I… I don't want to scare you.”

 

“You mean because you're an alien?”

 

Kara tried and failed to respond. Lena smiled at her wide, then pouted sympathetically when Kara stuttered, unable to find words.

 

“It’s alright. The flying, how upset you were about seeing those bodies on tv, somehow looking out-of-this-world first thing in the morning?” The impish quirk of Lena’s lips to drive home her point once again forced a flush to Kara’s skin. “Besides, NASA has been saying for years that there's life on other planets. You're not that _edgy_ , Kara.”

 

“You weren't kidding about being hard to impress, were you?” Kara couldn't lie, she felt a bit deflated.

 

“We all have our idiosyncrasies, don't we?” She seemed to want to elaborate, but changed her mind. “Tell me about yourself, Kara. I’d love to get to know you.”

 

Lena waited patiently for her to figure out where to start. Kara felt a frisson of elation that she didn't have to hide anything from her anymore. "When I was a child, my planet, Krypton, was dying. I was sent to Earth to protect my cousin. But my pod got knocked off course, and by the time I got here, my cousin was already beyond my help. He's who LuthorCorp was looking for the night your father was killed. I’m so sorry.”

 

In the past, she’d had a bone-deep revulsion to thinking of Kal-El’s death as unpreventable; another of Earth’s pacifying fables for children imparted by misguided humans who didn't comprehend the depth of her failure. But as she spoke it aloud, the words foreign yet untroubled as they escaped her, there was no accompanying queasy backlash, no incapacitating self-loathing. The reality of losing Kal-El no longer frightened her.

 

Regardless of how undeserving Kal-El was of his bleak fate and lonely journey to Rao’s brilliance, she wasn’t meant to be the one to spare him of it. Kara never had the power to save him, and it had taken her twelve years to believe it. The clarity ripped through layers of defenses she barely remembered building to protect herself from truths she needn't have feared.

 

There was no choice in losing her family, her people, her culture, her future on Krypton or her life here with baby Kal-El. But _Earth._  Her friends; Alex, and Maggie and Eliza and Jeremiah. Dewfall and ice cream and bearhugs and the kindness of strangers who smiled freely without even knowing her name. Frailty the likes of which Kryptonians could not imagine and the hope that shined all the brighter for it. Flawed people like her adoptive family, who taught her that even the blackest of hearts contained enough light to help the vulnerable find a way to survive. Humanity’s capacity for forgiveness, of which she had not seen a limit… These things she could still protect.

 

Though she hadn't spoken or shifted from her spot on the hammock, Kara heard Lena’s heart pound wildly. Her expression was reminiscent of what must have been Kara’s own the first time she watched a bird from this world take flight.

 

This time, Kara would have to make a choice. Even if it meant losing the only family she had left, because within her was the power to make a difference on this planet. And that was a _blessing_.

 

“What happened to my dad wasn’t your fault,” Lena announced suddenly, sober and resolved. “If we were each held responsible for the actions of our parents, there wouldn’t be anyone left to fight to make things better. And I'm sorry about your cousin, Kara.”

 

“It’s okay. I mean... it’s getting there, anyway. It _will_ be. For you and your mom, as well.” Lena, unreadable, stared into Kara’s eyes long enough to make her question if she was even seeing her, and then nodded.

 

“I hope so, too. You’re quite persuasive when you're confident, aren't you, Ms. Zor-El? What happened after you fell to Earth?”

 

Feeling the opposite of confident and slipping closer to overstimulated teenage schoolgirl territory because of the way Lena said her name, Kara continued nervously. “It feels good just to talk about this - I can't even explain, Lena. The Luthors found me, took me in and introduced me to a freakin’ genius family who taught me to understand myself once I got here. To most people, I’m just that _other_ Luthor kid; quiet and forgettable and … well, I'm the alien and I'm still the most boring person in the family.”

 

At that, Lena snorted lightly, her cheeks shining from the dried tear streaks down her face. “You could’ve fooled me.”

 

Kara shrugged with exaggerated humility. “I kinda  _did_ ,” she said, as innocently as she dared.

 

Lena raised an eyebrow, closed the book in her lap and wagged it scoldingly at Kara before tossing it onto the card table. “Kinda _barely_. “I’m casually  _allergic_ to your rock from outer space?” Which I will thoughtfully relocate to the storm cellar, due to your highly sensitive nature.”

 

Kara winced when she remembered the Kryptonite in the file cabinet. “Hey, toxic space stones are totally an Earth thing, too. You've never seen _The Dark Crystal_?”

 

“That's not how anything worked in that movie, Kara.”

 

“Really? _I've_ never seen _The Dark Crystal_. Is it good?”

 

Lena tapped a finger against Kara’s collarbone, and Kara’s grin only widened. “ _You_. _You_ need to stop.” She swallowed, shook her head, and looked away from Kara, who was well aware of how the hammock’s bowing pushed them close together. “So what will you do?”

 

After a long exhale, Kara kicked up her legs, rolled sideways and laid perpendicular to Lena on the hammock, facing the open barn window. She didn't urge Lena one way or the other to join her, but as she focused on the moon through the panel, a slight shift in weight on the netting indicated that Lena was now lying beside her, surveying the night sky as well. A light snag behind her ear when she tilted her neck reminded Kara that a single plumeria flower had survived their misadventure, spared a watery grave by Lena’s sense of whimsy.

 

“I’m not sure. But I can't wait around any more. I think that's been my problem. Waiting for things to go back to normal, or just to _feel_ normal. After I woke up and it sank in that I was alone here, I… My mother - on Krypton - _Alura_ was her name. She used to say that I had the heart of a hero, but I still didn't save my cousin and I guess I never planned what I should do after that. I just accepted that the rest of my life was... _broken_ and that it would stay that way. I didn't want to think past it. I don't know if I wanted to live through it. So I just stopped thinking. Kept moving.”

 

The back of Lena’s index finger wiped away the tear in the corner of her eye before Kara could. “You're not alone, Kara. And your mother was right about you, you know.”

 

“All I know now for sure is that I’ll die before I allow another world to end when I could save it.” She felt Lena’s eyes on her, face half obscured in shadow and neither of them spoke for a while, content to sway delicately with the serene gusts flowing in through the window.

 

Lena was the first to break the silence, the roughness in her voice indicating that she was fighting sleep. “So… want to tell me about Krypton?”

 

“Whaddya wanna know?” Kara didn't sound much more peppy herself.

 

“Wow, let me think. How about, is there anything people here do that we take for granted on Earth but maybe Kryptarians - Kryptonese...?” she floundered, clearly uncomfortable in her ignorance of something so important to Kara.

 

“Kryptonians. Kryptonese is the name of the primary language, though,” she added, helpfully.

 

Lena shifted onto her side and deftly managed to prop her head up in one hand, resting her elbow in the netting. “Hmm. _So,_ is there anything Earthlings do regularly that Kryptonian society would consider taboo?”

 

An incredulous bark of laughter burst from Kara. “ _That's_ your first question? Seriously, Lena, I'm beginning to suspect that your naïve _farmers_ _only_ _dot_ _com_ persona is some sort of secret identity.”

 

_“I’m beginning to suspect that you believe I won’t get up and flip you from this hammock, Kara Zor-El. And excuse me, I didn't realize that innocent curiosity was considered a crime on Krypton.”_

 

_“Pffft. You know what, though? There was one thing that especially freaked me out when I got here and started learning about Earth: fantasy novels.”_

 

_“Wait, you mean like Tolkien? Swords and sorcery? That kind?”_

 

_“Yes, exactly! So much dragon murder! Just way, waaay too much preoccupation with slaughtering dragons.”_

 

_“And now I have so many more questions.”_

 

Unseen and unheard above the back forty acres behind the main portion of the Kent property, hovered Clark Kent, watching the low-lit barn from a distance. He frowned and shifted in the sky to skim the house, unbothered by the rainfall. Seeing no movement, he spared one last disquieted glance at the barn before climbing higher into the air and gliding in the direction of where Kara Luthor’s vehicle awaited abandoned underwater.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's so late, editing this chapter was a complete grind. Also, since my goal is to write this in a way where you don't have to have watched Smallville or Supergirl S1 to follow along, I can just tell you now that the mass grave is Fort Rozz from season one, in case you're unfamiliar. It has very different significance in this fic, obviously, where it's almost moot whether or not Kara knows the exact origin of the ship. But at least now the real fun can begin. As always, feel free to let me know what you think and thanks for reading!


	9. Chapter 9

Of the last twenty-four hours, Alex Danvers had spent most of it stressed out at the police station. She was lucky that people tended to heed Maggie's warnings, or one of the other cops would have kicked her off the comfiest couch in the third floor staff lounge during the night. Though it was early, the station already buzzed with voices, ringing phones and heavy footfalls of officers going about their business. A quick scan of the room, empty besides the furniture, a fridge, a microwave and a blessed coffee maker, proved what Alex had known would happen. Dawn was breaking but Maggie was still at it, despite her sneaky, noncommittal implication that she would get some rest. With a groan, Alex stretched her limbs then emerged to search over the back of the sofa to see her girlfriend wearing yesterday's clothes at her desk, absorbed in the text on her monitor.

 

Sliding Maggie's leather jacket from her torso, which must have been covertly draped over her while she slept, Alex checked her phone charging on the table next to her. Kara hadn't tried to text her back or call at all last night, even after Alex threatened to plan an 80’s horror movie marathon for the next time they hung out if Kara didn't reply. Something was wrong.

 

“Hey, sleepyhead! My kingdom for some caffeine?” Maggie had spotted her shifting around via the glass wall dividing the rooms and called out to her through the doorway, eyebrows raising playfully when she caught Alex’s eye. “If you don't mind the precinct bearing witness to your morning Frankenstein walk to the Keurig.”

 

“Why would I mind when they don't care that you're a vampire, apparently.” Alex popped her knees with an extra stretch of her legs. “Did you even sleep?”

 

“Bring coffee and I'll tell you everything. We're gonna need it.”

 

Maggie hadn't interrogated her when Alex dropped in hoping for answers as to why Lillian Luthor was slithering around with her fangs bared over the alien bodies on the news. When Alex would say that there were certain stories that weren't hers to tell, described as “family matters, but not exactly mine,” Maggie respected her privacy and assumed it to be “Kara stuff.” So Detective Sawyer collected on every favor she'd ever pulled for ex-military officers in the precinct and then some. Her efforts netted her a grab bag of Luthor-affiliated sources with information that could potentially link to the nuclear gravesite. Some were eager to share what they knew, grateful that someone would finally take their grievances seriously, but others were leery to stick their necks out with no guarantee they wouldn't be lopped off.

 

One man alleged that his brother, a heavy equipment operator, had been killed in a “freak accident’ on LuthorCorp orders after getting cold feet when his contract work for them landed him at the scene of a murder. Before a gas explosion in his full electric home took his life as he slept, he’d shown his brother a memento from the job - a green fragment of crystal that appeared similar to the rocks on television.

 

Another was a woman on Facebook, a department head at Lord Industries but formerly the sanitation crew manager of the LuthorCorp-owned and operated Thorul Airbase. She had documented dates for when the place was on lockdown and lowly clock punchers like her and her employees weren't allowed into the facility due to the “Cadmus Protocol” security procedure. One of the dates coincided with Kara's arrival on Earth.

 

The account that Maggie spent most of her sleepless night clarifying was peculiar even for Luthor level intrigue. A woman had been hounding the U.S. MIA Accounting office for ten years to investigate her son’s disappearance. Her filed claim stated that he had been working with LuthorCorp to apprehend an “extraterrestrial being” in South America and that he never came home, leaving the creature he was hunting still at-large. Jim Harper was his name, and according to the mother, he’d been an agent working on a joint venture between the U.S. military and LuthorCorp stationed at Thorul Airbase. He’d spared her the details in order to keep her safe, but she knew that he was assigned to a division called “Project Cadmus.”

 

“What in the hell is Cadmus?” The hair behind Maggie's left ear fluttered from Alex’s breath, who was leaning on the back of her office chair with one arm, reading along with every click of the mouse.

 

“Are you about to dive into the monitor to chase after this, Doc? Because that's the vibe I’m getting.” Maggie spun around in her seat, forcing Alex to take a step back or else fall over in her lap. Not an unpleasant turn of events out-of-context but Alex had already asked enough of her without getting her fired on top of it. “My question is, how deep in are we going to go?”

 

“We? No, Lillian’s already trying to use you as a bargaining chip in her head games. I’m not going to make it easy for her.”

 

Sure, Maggie was capable, damn good at her job and just plain didn't intimidate. But the target was on her back. It didn't need to expand to cover her whole life because she actively made herself a pain in the ass. Plus, the extent of Maggie's knowledge on Kara was her black sheep family status and that she was like Alex’s little sister - nothing of Kara's real background. So in the middle of a dangerous interplanetary conspiracy with the Luthors at the epicenter? Maybe not the right time to crack open the spine of that tome.

 

“You're gonna bench me on this? Are you serious?” Maggie crossed her arms over her chest and cocked her head to the side, taken aback. “This woman comes at you at work with _my_ name in her mouth, and I’m supposed to let her get away with it so she can go experiment on E.T.?”

 

“Wait, what? You're telling me you believe that the crater really is an alien crash site?” As always, Alex was vigilant to maintain a mask of neutrality when it came to discussion of extraterrestrials with the “under informed.” She grew up knowing that her brilliant, visionary parents were considered crackpots in most academic circles. It rubbed many of their contemporaries the wrong way when they posited Earth had been host to peaceful aliens for years with an assuredness that many found pompous.

 

Not even getting into how hyper-aware Alex became of the negative portrayal of aliens in fiction once befriending Kara, she was cautious in choosing whose opinion she tolerated on extraterrestrials. A handful of friendships throughout her life had ended abruptly and dramatically when the other party made offhand remarks about aliens and Alex wound up coming off as oversensitive when she turned someone’s quirky aside into a passionate debate. It was a touchy issue for her and important to an extent that some would call a “dealbreaker.”

 

She’d never had a serious conversation about it with Maggie beyond occasionally sharing what her parents were up to in their latest research, which Maggie was receptive to without triggering any red flags. But spelling out that aliens were real and, oh, Kara happened to be one was a different ball game. Alex’s palms began to sweat.

 

Maggie’s shoulders jerked upward in a reluctant shrug. “I don’t know what to think, but if LuthorCorp has their paws all over it… Lillian Luthor’s company is notorious for collecting disgraced eggheads. When that college professor in the news last year got caught sewing co-eds together in his basement, do you not remember saying to me, “Well, _he’s_ got a job waiting for him at LuthorCorp?”

 

Alex took a seat on the corner of Maggie's desk and lowered her voice, glancing furtively at the other officers who might overhear. Lillian could have plants all over the department for all she knew. “That was hyperbole! It doesn't mean that everyone there is violent and dangerous. And what I _said_ was “I bet LuthorCorp told him he needed more work experience.”

 

“Forgetting for a second that Luthor interests aren't pro-immigration even within Earth’s atmosphere, what else would a bunch of mad scientists want with a blown up spaceship?” When Alex had no answer, Maggie laid a hand on her knee and squeezed, looking up at her and forcing eye contact to insure Alex got her point. “And you’re a nerd. What does Lillian Luthor want from you? For as long as we’ve been together, this woman has ignored your boundaries like it’s a hobby. I don’t know what’s more screwy - that it’s because you know her daughter or that it _isn’t._ ”

 

Alex jumped when her phone began vibrating on the desk.

 

“Jesus, let me answer if that’s her.” Maggie watched as Alex checked her screen and quickly pulled it to her chest, out of Maggie's reach. The incoming call from “Mrs. LL” gave the impression that her phone was shaking out of agitation.

 

“Maggie, _no._ ”

 

Maggie held out her hand with a smirk. “She spooked my girlfriend. Least I can do is invite her to my party. Think she'll mind stuffing herself with candy and hanging from a rope?” asked Maggie, deadpan. “Rich people candy, though.”

 

Repressing a smile, Alex held up a finger and searched for a more private location. “Stop; I cannot be laughing when I talk to this woman.”

 

“Bon-bons, European stuff I can’t pronounce. That good shit; she’ll know what I mean.” Maggie pointed her to the fire exit but her concern shown clearly in the way her eyes followed Alex across the room.

 

As she pushed the heavy metallic door open with her side, Alex called out slyly, “Just in case I have to bust out the adult language.”

 

“You’re such a tease, Danvers,” drawled Maggie, shaking her head as the stairwell door closed and Alex disappeared from view.

 

Persistent as ever, Lillian's call continued to roll through after a solid forty-five seconds. She must have hung up on the voicemail and called back.

 

“What _now,_ ” muttered Alex, and turned around to lean against the door.

 

“Don't answer that,” said a voice matter-of-factly, before her phone was knocked from her hand and sent tumbling down the dirty metal stairs with a clatter and the vibrating stopped. A tall figure in a grey hoodie and aviators stood right inside the door on the grimy platform as if he'd been waiting.

 

On instinct, Alex struck out at him with the flat of her palm, but her hand glanced off his nose and knocked the hood back and off of his head. Even in dark glasses, Lex Luthor was immediately recognizable. He didn't have the decency to even flinch.

 

“The _hell_ , Lex?! What are you doing lurking around like the unibomber?!” She shook him off when he went to grab her forearm and then stepped onto the stairs in case she had to make a break for it. He could overpower her if her back was to him and she tried to wrench open the door she'd just entered. “Did your mom send you? You realize we're in a police station? Keep that in mind if you’re going to be jumping people.”

 

He exhaled through his teeth in frustration and sweat beaded his forehead and scalp. “No, I’m not… The woman would see red if she found out that I fled Metropolis and came to see you. That's why she can't know we're working together.”

 

“We’re _working_ together? Do you mean you're paying me to stand here and let you work on my last nerve?”

 

After a moment of staring at her in incomprehension, he chuckled and lifted his sunglasses, exposing bright red-rimmed eyes and a gleam of desperation that unsettled her.

 

“I’ll be damned. I think I actually missed you, Alexandra... And I need your help to take down my parents.”

 

“This can’t be happening,” Alex said, talking to herself. When his shoulders sagged, she rolled her eyes and sighed, then raised them to meet his. “It's a lot to digest, you have to admit.”

 

“You think that's a mindfuck? Guess why I didn’t have to take the fire escape to reach the roof entrance?” He raised an arm upwards, miming a long jump with his fist.

 

She surveyed the stairwell to be sure no one else was hanging out listening on nearby floors and hissed, “Are you kidding me? _How_?”

 

“Probably the same way I can see that little velvet box buried in the bottom of your purse,” he replied, staring at the wall in the direction of where her bag sat on Maggie’s desk in the next room. “Nice ring. You should be proud of yourself - it takes guts to pop the question.”

 

Alex gasped and smacked him on the arm without thinking. “ _Shhh_!” His skin beneath the hoodie was unyielding like steel. Like Kara’s. Lex nodded understandingly at her when she yanked her hand away in surprise.

 

“Alex, I know that we’ve had our... issues in the past, but I trust you. I do. So I need you to be honest with me because no one else seems to grasp the concept!” He laughed bitterly, a tinge of hysteria creeping into his voice.

 

“Tell me what is _going on_ , Lex.” She almost patted his shoulder, but curbed the impulse and kept her hands to herself. Years of tension similar to that of divorcée parents who never suffered through the trainwreck of attraction and marriage to reach their magnitude of contempt was hard to shake.

 

His head twitched a few times while he collected his composure and Alex realized that Lex’s symptoms bore a striking resemblance to someone in withdrawals.

 

Finally, he asked clearly and with the single-minded focus of the Lex Luthor she remembered, “What are your thoughts on the plausibility of engineering a Human-Kryptonian hybrid?”

 

 

* * *

 

 

“What time do you wake up?” Kara yawned and wiped the sleep from her eyes. The chirping of birds greeted her when she came to her senses. Outside the barn, the sky was a golden-pink, the sun barely cresting on the horizon.

 

Lena, showered and dressed in jeans and a v-neck tee with her hair pulled up in a ponytail, tossed something metallic and jangly Kara’s way, which she caught without trying. Her keyring bearing the LuthorCorp insignia, somehow safe and sound.

 

“Whatever time sounds good to the roosters,” said Lena breezily. “You were out for the count, I couldn't wake you but my mom left us breakfast. She’s in town for the day with Clark.”

 

“How did you get these?” She sat up in the hammock and swung the keyring around her finger. “I know I left them in the car last night.”

 

“Clark towed it out when the rain let up. It's parked in the driveway, but I don't know if I can fix this one. I’ll give it a shot if you think you can pull it into my workshop later.” Lena waited for her reply expectantly, and Kara inferred that she was subtly inquiring about the extent of her abilities.

 

“Sure. I can do that.” Clark Kent. Jack-of-All-Trades, apparently. Kara resolved to suck it up and thank the guy whenever she saw him again. “It was nice of your cousin to fish it out.”

 

“He's a good man. My dad used to joke that he wanted to be like Clark when he grew up.” Lena considered Kara, coming to an inscrutable decision before speaking. “You should talk to him sometime. The two of you have more in common than you’d think.”

 

Kara grunted. “Yeah? Like what?”

 

An enigmatic smile flickered upon Lena's face and then disappeared. “Not my business to tell. But he's trustworthy. Just so you know.”

 

“Hm.” Kara wasn't sure what exactly Lena was getting at, but she would keep it in mind. If only for further validation that she was right about something being off about him.

 

“So you can really carry a car?” asked Lena, abruptly changing the subject. “By yourself?” For someone who claimed to be difficult to impress, Lena had a way of appraising her with such promise in those bright, clear eyes of hers that it made Kara feel lightheaded.

 

“No problem,” she declared, and rolled off the hammock and smoothly onto her feet. Lena’s eyes widened in wonder when Kara lifted from the ground and glided backwards towards the barn window panel. “How about I get a shower, we eat, and then…”

 

“...And then?” asked Lena, skepticism and enticement intermingling in her tone as she looked up at her.

 

The morning light cast on Kara's back wasn't the sole source of the energy flowing through her body and her mind. A mission. A purpose. She felt alive again, and she hadn't thought she ever would. “If they're coming, I’m going to be ready for them. I’m gonna make a stand. And that means I need to train.”

 

“You're going to, what, fight them? The military, your family?” Lena stepped closer to her, shaking her head. “Kara, I know you feel responsible but you don't have to-”

 

“I do. I need to. I’ve needed to for a long time. Protecting your family and Smallville is as close as I can get to making things right. For myself, too. So after breakfast, make sure to take off any jewelry. ‘Cause we're goin’ flyin’!”

 

Lena’s eyebrows shot heavenward and she went completely still. In a high pitch previously unheard to Kara, she asked, “ _Excuse me_?”

 

With her face lit up by an infectious smile, Kara continued out the window and announced, “I’m gonna meet so many new birds!”

 

Lena, held a hand to her forehead and laughed as Kara ascended into the sky, giggling excitedly.

 

Two hours later, Kara had outraced three chickenhawks, a bluebird and a flock of goldfinches. The expanse of the blue sky was unmarred by smog or skyscrapers, helicopters or security cameras. A flying woman in khakis and a polo shirt would have been front page news if she tried this in Metropolis, but here she was free. Wind whipped her hair as she took a moment just to be, limbs outstretched, breathing deeply, focused on the clouds and the warmth of the sun imparting a heady tranquility.

 

“Hey, Lena?”

 

“Yes?”

 

“Think I could teach all the chickenhawks to fly in v-formation behind me?”

 

“Sure, but take care they don't start resenting you,” Lena shouted, fifty feet below her and standing in a lush green field with an arm thrown over her eyes, watching. “You won’t have anyone to play with.”

 

“What about you? Come up here with me.” Kara swooped down, halting her descent when she was eye-level with Lena, nearly upside down in the air. “You know I won’t drop you,” she reminded her, singsong.

 

“Why do I feel like Wendy, about to be carted off to Neverland by Peter Pan?” While they were eating, Lena had encouraged Kara to make the most of the open air, but proved reluctant to join her once she reached lift off. Kara didn't want to tease her about it but now that her life wasn't in peril, she suspected Lena had a tiny fear of heights.

 

Kara tucked in her legs, spun end-over-end in place and then dropped next to Lena, grinning proudly. “Did I look like Sonic the Hedgehog?”

 

“Oh my god,” whispered Lena melodramatically and grimaced. “How did I not see it sooner? You’re a _dork_.”

 

Her hands clasped behind her back, Kara bounced on the balls of her feet and swayed forward so that she and Lena were toe-to-toe. “What if you step on my feet and-”

 

It became immediately apparent that Kara hadn't thought this through. Allowing her giddiness to get the best of her landed her up close and personal with Lena, whose heart she could hear beating like a hummingbird in her chest. The shaky intake of breath and heavy lidded gaze that swept from Kara’s eyes down to her mouth and stayed there sent a shiver through her that ended in a quiet gasp that broke Lena's concentration.

 

“Kara,” she murmured. “There’s something that I… that I should probably tell you. But with everything that’s happening, I don’t know where to start.”

 

“Oh.” Kara chuckled, and couldn't help but beam at her. “It’s okay. It’s the same for me.”

 

Lena blinked, unprepared for her frankness. Nudging the tips of her toes beneath Lena's feet, Kara gingerly slipped her hands around to rest on her hips. Silently, Lena wrapped her arms around Kara's neck in a loose embrace.

 

“Is this alright?”

 

“Don’t do a barrel roll,” advised Lena, expression wistful.

 

They arose above the field, Kara keeping a leisurely pace during their ascent. It was different this time, with Lena’s attention riveted to her, gradually pulling her closer the higher they climbed. When their elevation portrayed the Kent house as a yellow speck in the distance, Kara letup and time stood still with the two of them suspended in the air.

 

She gently swirled them around in a strange kind of slow dance to a music only felt, not heard. “Not so bad, is it?”

 

“Not at all.”

 

“Thanks for trusting me. I swear I won't fly us too close to the sun,” said Kara, luxuriating in the feel of Lena’s body against hers. That same sense of rightness from the night before struck again. Under other circumstances she may have felt guilty for enjoying this so much, but the unabashed hunger in Lena’s gaze banished the thought.

 

“You don’t think we are already?”

 

“What do you think?”

 

Lena hesitated and observed the world around them, taking in the clouds above and earthbound problems so far below, then met Kara’s eyes and at last replied throatily, “Worth the risk.”

 

The kiss began languidly, testing the strength of the unfamiliar magic ensnaring them. Lena pressed her mouth against Kara's bottom lip, tipped her head to chase her upper lip, then placed one hand delicately against Kara's cheek like she was something soft and cherished, and they breathed one another in, colors exploding behind Kara eyelids like fireworks. Then Lena dipped her head and lost herself in the kiss, going liquid in her arms and suddenly Kara was kissing her back with an urgency that made her question if it was their bodies spinning or just her mind.

 

It was the happiest Kara had ever felt on Earth, drifting weightless with Lena across the sun-drenched Kansas skyline.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

_Circa twenty six years ago_

 

**_HELP_ **

 

_The cry pierced through his thoughts, unlike any he had heard on the planet, a telepathic broadcast that entered the psyche like the stab of a blade._

 

**_HELP US_ **

 

_And so he launched himself towards it, breaking through the underbrush to the sky and gliding over the vast green highland jungle without even considering who or what he would find. The desperation in the plea was painfully similar to prayers for C’eridyall’s mercy with which he had once, several lifetimes ago, grown far too familiar._

 

_A mother. He knew. The psychic call was from a mother who had run out of options._

 

**_PLEASE_ **

 

_By the time he reached her, he had crossed thousands of miles and her transmissions had ceased. The city lights illuminated the darkened horizon of National City in the distance. Waves lapped gently against the beach, the peace broken by muffled sobs of a child. A humanoid body of a woman lay outstretched and lifeless on red sand and a little girl, certainly too small to be left alone, was curled over her with the woman's head cradled in her lap._

 

_In only a moment, the child’s thoughts revealed the melancholy and fear, the joy and the laughter and the instability borne from a life on the run - all that she had ever known._

 

_The girl felt his presence and pulled herself away from the corpse only far enough to face him. Silence settled between them as they took measure of one another. He approached slowly and she didn't shriek. Seeing himself through her eyes - an odd, impossibly tall figure, his cape flapping behind him in the ocean breeze - he risked extending a hand down to her._

 

_He’s so sad, she thought. He tried to smile but the light from the full moon at his back obscured it in shadow._

 

_“Hello, Lena. My name is J’onn J'onzz. Your mother asked that I come help you.”_

 

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp! I can't tell you how fun you all have made writing this story. I actually know how it ends but you guys don't so I just want to thank you for being patient and trusting by making it this far, even through the wtfery. Please, feel free to leave your thoughts and thanks for reading! Take care, fam.


	10. Chapter 10

The sound of the two liter of rootbeer rolling around in the truck bed behind them prompted Martha Kent to glance in the rearview mirror and then to Clark beside her, sitting behind the steering wheel.

 

“Don’t say it. I know I should have put that bag up front with us.”

 

“I wasn’t going to say anything.”

 

Clark's lips quirked in a suppressed smile. “You don’t have to.”

 

Grey, purposeful clouds had gathered across the sky over Smallville sooner than the weatherman predicted, and so Clark suggested taking her home early. The morning so far was spent mentally mopping up the mess from the days bleeding together. Her step felt heavier, her eyes strained; it was as if she had aged ten years overnight. Pouring her heart out to Clark in a quiet booth at their favorite diner proved productive, but exhausting. Especially considering that he countered her revelation about Jonathan's death with his own about the true nature of Kara Luthor.

 

Somehow, Lena’s affinity for her now made a lot more sense. Of the Luthors and their assorted flunkies who had found their way to the farm, Kara was the first her daughter had allowed to cross the threshold of their home. Not even Lillian Luthor, whose car Lena helped fix up, had passed her daughter's standards of decency. “ _She’s miasmic, Mom. The way she stared at me. That woman is so bitter, she's contagious_ ,” warned her daughter. _“Don't let her step foot in this house.”_

 

Knowing what she did now, when Martha recounted the quick meeting with Lillian over LCEK, there were a dozen minute tics and gestures that gave the woman away as a monster capable of murder. Or it could be a trick of hindsight to ease her guilt - to tell herself that if she looked the killer of her husband in the face, she loved him enough to at least have an inkling.

 

Lionel Luthor had conducted himself with charm during his visit, agreeing to hold their negotiations over coffee in town. He even footed the bill for everyone in the shop, but Lena later insisted that he had “cold spots” inside of him. Her daughter had turned him away herself, though more kindly than Martha would have expected. If she didn't know any better, Lena had taken a shine to the old snake.

 

Lex, the last Luthor before Kara, had come the closest to earning Lena’s trust and the two even shared a laugh on the front porch. But by then Clark had already engaged in espionage at the refinery and discovered the meteor rocks stacked to the ceiling inside. Lex may well have been genuine about his promise to utilize LCEK to usher Smallville into a brighter future, at least temporarily. Even if Lex was misinformed about his family’s underhandedness, who knew whether he would be an ally if the truth came to light? No one ascended to the title of “billionaire” without leaving a ladder made of broken people beneath them to get there and if the Luthors would lie to their own son, all bets were off about what else they could be hiding. Lex had flown away, tires squealing, with only a tupperware tray of french cookies for his trouble.

 

And then there was Kara.

 

“Do you think she’s developing feelings for her?”

 

The soft crunch of gravel and splashing of water beneath the vehicle was Martha’s reply. “I’ve never quite seen Lena get so wrapped up in someone like this,” she continued as Clark’s attention remained locked on the road ahead. “Especially so quickly. And she's a Luthor to boot.”

 

Clark chuckled and fixed her with an amused, knowing look. “I don’t know about that. Remember her unrequited crush on Lana Lang, former cheerleader? Couldn't say a word about it without Lena bolting from the room.”

 

“Oh, boy, am I glad we all made it through that phase. I’m grateful she met a few young women over the years who eased her out of her shell but... But I can’t shake the feeling that this is different. Am I wrong? You would tell me if she was getting in too deep here, wouldn't you?”

 

A clanking noise echoed behind them as the pop bottle rolled up the truck bed and Clark slowed the vehicle and shifted into park. “Martha. I only know what Lena knows. Perhaps you should speak with her. For whatever reason, I can't read Ms. Luthor’s mind to know how she feels about anything. Must be a Kryptonian resistance.”

 

Clark opened his door and hopped out, and his boots sloshed through the water on the road as he approached the truck bed. Out in the distance, a familiar yellow spot on the horizon marked where she could kick off her shoes and clear her mind before figuring out a plan of action.

 

Martha craned her neck to watch him secure the groceries and return clutching a plastic package reading “ _Chocos_ ” across the top. “You can’t be hungry already, we ate an hour ago,” scolded Martha through his opened door. As a formality, he feigned hiding the cookies behind his back, knowing full well she’d spotted his contraband.

 

“I’ve been thinking about them since we left the store,” he said, solemn and placing the package on his lap after returning to his seat. “And I won’t be shamed for my appetite, Martha, not after the night I had lugging your esteemed guest’s car out of the water.”

 

Martha held up her hands defensively, watching as he ripped open the plastic and pulled out half a sleeve of chocolate cookies. “Was I _going_ to shame you?”

 

“Say what you want to say.” Clark shifted back into drive, his food resting between them in the seat. “And, no, I am not going to buckle them in, too. I don’t have a “ _Choco problem_.”

 

“Did I _say_ you did?”

 

“You know I hate that question. When will you stop taking this personally?” Clark pointedly placed an entire cookie in his mouth, refusing to take his eyes off the road.

 

He was using Martha’s eyesight to precisely locate the opening of the package without risking looking her in the face. Now that was just cheating. “I’ll admit I can’t help but wonder how after all of the chocolate desserts I have made for you over the years, still you prefer this fake stuff. At a certain point it's not happenstance, J’onn, it's a choice.”

 

Clark, suddenly ruffled, spoke through a mouthful of dark, ominous corn syrup and preservatives to remind her, “Careful. She might hear.” The farm driveway entrance awaited a solid fifty feet ahead. “I don’t know her range.”

 

“I doubt she’d be distracted enough to listen in on us if Lena’s taken with her. You know, maybe I should be more worried about what _I_ might hear the closer we get.”

 

“Fair point,” muttered Clark, decelerating to cross the bump where the road met the property. “And may I say, I’m genuinely relieved that for once I can't read someone's mind. If Ms. Luthor's thoughts are half as graphic as what your daughter’s been thinking about her, I wouldn't be able to eat at all.”

 

“God in heaven, stop there. I don't want to hear any of it.” Lena could play aloof, but Martha knew her daughter and behind that facade was a tea kettle of emotion just waiting on the right person to whistle for, as her grandmother would have put it.

 

Clark considered her a moment, eyes narrowed, and then she heard his voice slip into her mind like a gentle gust through an open window.

 

_I’ll make you a deal; I go cold turkey on the Chocos if you bake me something that wipes the phrase_ “ _neck muscles like she trains competitively to scream women’s names_ ” _from my memory_.

 

“ ** _Clark_** _!”_

 

“Well, they'll both know you’re home now.”

 

* * *

 

“Did you hear that?”

 

Lena’s hands halted their thorough massage and she inhaled a labored breath, staring into Kara's eyes. “What?”

 

Kara, who had been chewing a square of fudge so large that Lena had made her promise not to choke to death on it, spun around in panic when she recognized the voices. “Crap! You're mom’s gonna be back any minute, we gotta clean up!”

 

The kitchen was a wreck. Pans and baking sheets of a wide variety were resting on cabinets, the table, the chairs; every available surface full of various sweets. Mostly full, anyhow. A few hours ago Kara had decided on testing her heat vision next, but had accidentally carved an obscenely shaped crop circle into the field on the other side of the road. Fortunately, all of the flying had made her hungry and Lena realized the perfect method of retraining her control and focus: baking. Flour and egg shells littered the linoleum, and the entire house smelled of fresh baked goods. Once Kara remembered how fun and rewarding it was to cook things in a fraction of the normal time with her powers, she and Lena had gone a little wild with wanting to bake Martha some comfort food.

 

Lena ripped her fingers out of the banana bread dough she was kneading and pointed towards a closet door near the pantry. “Hurry, the broom! She’s so early!”

 

“Oh, geez!” Kara tipped her head toward the pan Lena had been immersed in. “Back up and then hop on the table!”

 

“You want me on the table? Kara, my mother is literally about to walk in the door,” Lena teased, playing at being appalled.

 

Kara shook her head with a laugh. “Just trust me, and keep all arms and legs inside the vehicle.” She narrowed her gaze at the raw banana bread and shot a concentrated beam of heat into the pan until it rose. Lena made a show of obeying her instructions and slid onto the tabletop backwards, sitting cross-legged, surrounded by cookies and cakes. Covered in ingredients, flour in her hair and smelling like some sort of sweet tooth heaven, Lena waiting expectantly on her was the most delicious sight Kara seen in years.

 

To Lena, she must have appeared as a blur of motion shifting chaos into order. Kara’s skill in using her speed to sweep the floor, wipe everything down and neatly organize their projects in the refrigerator and along the cabinet by the sink was the result of years of slumber parties at the Danvers’.

 

Kara made a mental note while emptying the dust pan to give Alex a call. She was likely wondering what was up by now, and with all of the new info Kara had been exposed to, there was an itch of concern at the back of her mind whenever she didn't get to at least text Alex twice a day. Thanks to her abilities, Kara was still relatively safer than Alex, even with the refinery within walking distance and possible LuthorCorp thugs closing in. She knew that Alex was brilliant, cautious and could take care of herself, and if she wouldn't, Maggie would. But if her family truly wanted leverage against her… they knew where to look.

 

Lena, slowed to near stillness on the kitchen table and her gaze unfocused in Kara's general direction, watched Kara work with lips parted in amazement as the room transformed around her. Kara was tempted to linger in that microsecond; stretch it to count Lena's eyelashes, the freckles on her neck, to bask in the elation of finally wanting someone who knew the real her and returned the sentiment. It was a relief that her speed prevented Lena from seeing the dopey look Kara suspected was plastered on her face.

 

By the sounds of an unfamiliar engine turning over outside, Clark had returned to his vehicle and was about to pull away. Martha’s footfalls approached the front porch, fumbling with her keys and several plastic grocery bags. Kara finished stacking the dishes in the sink and slowed her pace to run hot water. The world caught up with her, and Lena gasped from behind her.

 

“ _Wow_ ,” exclaimed Lena, glancing around the near pristine kitchen. “I didn't expect for you to Fantasia all of that away by yourself, Kara.”

 

While drying her hands on a couple of paper towels decorated with tiny cartoon roosters, Kara shrugged and turned around to face Lena, leaning against the cabinet. “It's no problem. I need the practice. But if your mom asks, we've been baking since she left this morning and it took forever to clean up.”

 

“I'm _hooome_ ,” called Martha, closing the front door behind her. Automatically, Lena greeted her warmly and rushed to relieve her of her bags. “What is that amazing smell?!”

 

“Everything, pretty much,” said Kara, watching from the kitchen doorway. She hung back, nervous about how Mrs. Kent may react to her in the harsh light of day.

 

“Smells like it!” chirped Martha, as Lena passed Kara to put away the groceries. Mrs. Kent smiled softly at Kara. “And how are you today?”

 

Kara shrugged, a small, gracious smile tugging at her lips. “Pretty well, thanks to Lena. She's good company. How are _you_ , Mrs. Kent?”

 

Martha gauged her, took stock of the state of her and nodded. “That's always nice to hear. And I’m… better than expected, considering everything.”

 

“You seem cheerful!” Lena called from the kitchen, her voice muted by the open refrigerator. “Talking with Clark helped?”

 

“It did, and now I’m beat, girls. Do you mind if I have a nap?”

 

This prompted Lena to poke her head into the room, puzzlement in her expression. “Everything alright?” She squinted at Martha, an eyebrow raised. Her look made Kara focus closer on Martha, who’s heart rate did maintain a slightly accelerated pace.

 

“We can talk later. And save me some of that whatever it is - I’m sure it's fantastic.” She turned toward the stairs. “Kara, I just want to say that I’m glad you're here. You couldn't have picked a better time, if I’m honest.”

 

“... _Moooom_ …?” asked Lena, drawn out and confused. She was eyeing Martha with outright suspicion now, standing beside Kara in the doorway.

 

Martha rounded the bannister and continued upstairs. “Sleep now. Talk later. Family meeting. You too, Ms. Luthor. Until then, you two stay out of trouble.”

 

“Hmm.” Lena watched her mother ascend to the second floor, then glanced at Kara. “She seem okay to you?”

 

“I think so. Could be a little exhausted. Anxious. Understandable.” Martha seemed a bit distant, but not maliciously so. And including Kara in their family business soothed the tension she had carried since last night. Martha didn't hate her. She wanted her here. For now, at any rate. Believing that she wasn't a homicidal Luthor was a beast of a different color compared to learning that she was harboring an alien. Lena was taking it well, though, so maybe there was hope.

 

“I suppose…” Breaking her gaze from the empty staircase, Lena contemplated their surroundings. The rain had finally broken outside and water pattered against the roof. “So we're finished heating things up. What next?”

 

Kara considered a moment, then directed a mischievous smile at Lena's expectant visage. "How does a little breath play sound?"

The scarlet flush sweeping across Lena's complexion was worth the misunderstanding. Kara snickered at her and rubbed her arm in placation. "What I mean is, grab some winter clothes and meet me outside."

 

"You've been spending too much time around me."

 

"As long as you know who's to blame."

 

 

* * *

 

 

Her life had experienced what Clark deemed a “paradigm shift” over the last twenty four hours, yes. And, sure, she was sleep-deprived. Learning what Clark had gleaned from Lena's thoughts about Kara Luthor when he flew by to check on them last night definitely contributed to Martha’s loss of equilibrium.

 

But this was not a result of being burdened to the breaking point. Talking with Clark had helped her peace of mind immensely. Martha Kent knew that she was not going through a nervous breakdown and she most definitely had not lost touch with reality.

 

And yet...

 

She dropped the apple back into the fruit bowl as she stepped into the living room to peer out the fore awning window. Water pelted the siding, and she could hear it even before her eyes confirmed the rain pouring down over the front and left sides of the property. Martha blinked, aiming at waking her tired eyes and returned to the kitchen where the exterior of the house grew quiet. The heater kicked on. It had been doing that when she was upstairs in bed but she had written it off as Lena leaving one of the doors downstairs open for too long.

 

Nothing was ajar and the windows were sealed tight. Crystalline veins of frost lined the windowsill over the sink. Through the glass pane in the back door, Martha could see a figure standing unmoving just off of the deck, all in white. Roughly five feet tall, it stared back at her with dull, unblinking eyes.

 

A snowman.

 

Lena’s shriek, muffled but clearly her daughter, echoed outside between the house and the barn wall, followed by the sound of her laughter. Quietly and as evenly as she could, Martha approached the door and peered out through one eye-level triangular segment. The snowman, with what appeared to be pointed dog ears atop its canine-shaped head, had an old red beach towel that fell behind it like a cape wrapped around its neck.

 

The lawn and field were a blanket of snow, snowflakes fluttering peacefully to the earth and so unlike the rainfall on the opposite end of the house. What should have been a half-flooded field had become a sheet of solid ice extending from the barn to the equipment shed.

 

Floating four feet in the chilled air was Kara Luthor, spinning in the center of the ice as Lena skated gracefully around her in her rain boots and winter coat. Kara wore her spare - a thick, deep blue jacket. Her daughter occasionally stooped at the edge where the ice met the snow and packed a snowball to throw at Ms. Luthor, who weaved through the sky to dodge or caught it and threw it back. Around Kara’s neck was the broad, red plush scarf Clark had given Lena a few birthdays back and it trailed down to her calves, swishing majestically with her movements. Martha watched her inhale a deep breath, tip her head back, and exhale a gust of frosted wind straight into the sky.

 

The girl was unlike anyone she’d met before. Even J’onn had been thrown for a loop by her, this “Kryptonian,” who confided in Lena and earned her trust. Who made her smile.

 

Martha crept away from the door and continued into the living room, stepping lightly so as not to attract Kara's notice, preoccupied as she was by her daughter. Neither of them seemed to be paying attention to the rest of the world and it was heartening to know that when things were at their darkest, she had raised a daughter who could still find the light. A framed polaroid photograph on the mantle caught her attention and she pulled it to her chest on her way to the sofa and sank down into the cushions.

 

Lena, on her eighth birthday, behind the wheel of a John Deere with Jonathan sitting behind her, both of them laughing as she herself stood a few feet away, pretending to be terrified for her life of their driving. J’onn’s thumb loomed blurrily in the corner of the photograph. He was on the farm for one of his visits -  before he had come to stay for good, before he carried the weight of that botched capture in Peru. Before he wore Jim Harper’s face. They were always so careful not to catch him on camera in any form, but Lena cherished the photo. The only picture they had of the whole family.

 

The fair had been in Smallville that week but Lena had decided she wanted to learn to drive the tractor instead. And monopolize J’onn’s time on the farm, she insisted, since she so rarely got to see him. Later that night, after Lena had gone to bed, J’onn told them that their daughter had been experiencing overstimulation in crowded environments and had avoided the fair to prevent worrying them in the likely event that she became upset surrounded by so many emotional fair-goers. Growing up special made for dozens of tiny adjustments along the way, and dealing with people without becoming drained by them was a skill that Lena continued to hone to this day.

 

Maybe it was the same for Ms. Luthor. She might understand searching for connection in a world that always seemed to hesitate to embrace her, all of her. What if this young woman was a gateway to the beginning of the rest of Lena's life? Could it be that she had finally met someone who could make her daughter see that her own future was just as important as everyone else’s?

 

If Lena was sent to the Kents in the unexpected form of a Green Martian arriving in the night and claiming that he’d read their minds and saw that in their kind, yearning hearts they were meant to be Lena’s family, then who was to say that Kara, too, wasn’t an unbidden blessing from above?

 

 

* * *

 

 

“I just wish we had some way of knowing what's truly happening out there,” lamented Eliza Danvers, tossing the latest CatCo magazine onto the motel dresser. It slid over the back and the cover photo of the Secretary of Defense, mid-sentence, claiming that there was no evidence of extraterrestrial contact slipped out of sight, his face an angry shade of pink. “Every bit of news we hear makes me worry about just what kind of story they wish to tell about this, and who’s in charge of telling it.”

 

Jeremiah Danvers, sitting back against the headboard on their rented bed and scrutinizing the laminated TV channel guide provided by the staff, exhaled wearily. “Honey, all we can do is continue to encourage an open-minded dialogue for those who will listen. These people; the government, the Luthors, whoever - they can only distort the truth for so long. Someday the real story of extraterrestrial civilizations will be told. And Kara’s will be one of those voices.”

 

The streetlight outside the window shined through the cheap, smoke-saturated curtains, the only other light source in the room besides the small table lamp on the nightstand next to Eliza. An ideal hideout the place was not, but it was off the grid enough for them to pay in cash and not leave a credit trail. After their daughter warned them of Lillian Luthor's impending social call, it hadn't taken long for any nagging doubt to dissipate. The moment she got off the phone with Alex, Eliza had sneaked a glance outside to see a black van parked down the street and two strange men pacing the beach behind the house.

 

They left their phones at home. After spending an hour being followed around the city until they were clear of suspicious vehicles trailing them, they decided that calling to let Alex know where they were was reckless. Intellectually, the Danvers knew that their daughter was a genius capable of outwitting a megalomaniacal control freak with billions of dollars at her disposal, but that didn't dull the fear. Alex was out there in a suddenly hostile and uncertain world and there was no way to help her.

 

“Maybe you're right,” Eliza replied, and joined him on the ugly green comforter of their ugly single motel room off an ugly, nondescript strip of highway two hours east of National City. She leaned her head on Jeremiah's shoulder and watched their feet rhythmically bump against each other in their socks, a silly little game they'd played since before they were married. “Maybe this will all work out for the best in the long run. Change isn't easy. Whether its origin is from above or below, it hurts. Like teeth coming in.”

 

“Growing pains,” murmured Jeremiah. “It was inevitable. Not looking forward to the new batch of internet jokes using that video of me on _Ancient Aliens_ , though.”

 

With a chuckle, Eliza pushed against his arm with her own. “Aw, come on. I liked that one with the mothman backup singers. It was clever.”

 

“Once I mentioned that it was possible for interstellar travellers to possess unheard of abilities within our solar system, they started playing Hitchcockian music after every word I said.” Jeremiah sighed disgustedly. “And then Kara watched it with Alex before we’d screened it first. It made Kara think everyone would be terrified of her.”

 

Eliza shook her head faintly. “You know, I think she already felt that way. It took months for her to open up about Krypton. I’m sure it was partially because it was painful, of course. But it was like she was afraid that we would find her ungrateful for wanting to remember who she was.”

 

“And it's not as if her _Earth_ _parents_ encouraged her to hold those memories close. Kara has had to suppress so much of herself, and not just her abilities.” Jeremiah shifted away from her a little and peered through the window. “Hey, what's going on out there?”

 

Car doors were slamming closed outside. A lot of car doors. Figures darted past the window and yelling erupted from nearby, likely a few rooms down. Engines roared to life and vehicles pealed out of the parking lot, clearly in a hurry.

 

“Eliza, get under the bed.” Jeremiah was on his feet and reaching behind the headboard for Alex’s old aluminum softball bat they'd brought for protection when a gunshot rang out, close enough to leave both of the Danvers’ heads ringing in the aftershock.

 

A gang of paramilitary in LuthorCorp branded gear were visible through the window by the door, the shiny gunmetal in their gloved hands gleaming under the streetlight. A dainty staccato knock rapped on the entrance, shocking in its politeness, followed immediately by a woman’s smug laughter.

 

“Can you imagine?” asked Lillian Luthor's voice, addressing someone outside. “Knock it down.”

 

Jeremiah barely had time to throw himself in front of his wife, wielding the bat, before the door blew inward and splintered to pieces and four LuthorCorp cronies entered the room battering ram first. Two more filed in, the first group dropped the battering ram, and all six of them fanned out as one, leveling stunguns at the Danvers. Confidently striding in behind them, Lillian Luthor entered the lineup and approached from right down the middle.

 

“Pardon the mess, but all things considered I’ve rescued you from an absolutely abysmal continental breakfast.” Dressed in a long dark coat, hands in her pockets and hair pulled into a bun, Lillian surveyed the Danvers with undisguised triumph. She smirked when she caught Eliza’s eyes flicker towards the landline phone on the nightstand. “Well, go on, then. _Try it_.”

 

Jeremiah gripped the bat tighter, prepared to swing without a moment’s notice if it meant buying Eliza more time to escape. “What do you want, Lillian? We’ll tell you whatever you want to know, just leave Alex out of it.”

 

“It would appear you've an ego large enough to rival your brain, Jeremiah, because you've got it all wrong. This isn't about you and your wife. Alexandra has always been the most promising member of your family.”

 

It happened in the span of three seconds. When Jeremiah recognized Lillian’s meaning, he tried to strike at her with the bat but failed to connect before one of the soldiers shot him in the abdomen. Jeremiah collapsed into convulsions on the stained carpet, the air crackling. In the same instant, Eliza Danvers whipped out a pistol from her waistband and aimed it at Lillian Luthor’s forehead.

 

“You're not going anywhere near my daughter.” Neither Eliza’s hands nor her voice trembled. “You thought that you could threaten my family and I would forget about it like some absent minded professor? That I wouldn't prepare myself for this possibility? I've been waiting on you for years, Lillian. So how about  _you_ _try it_?”

 

Lillian scoffed and motioned for her entourage to lower their weapons. Her appraisal of Eliza contained something she didn't recognize. It might have been respect, were Lillian capable of it. “How about we play out this scenario? You shoot me right between the eyes. My men execute you and your husband, and the three of us die together in this fleabag motel. Tragic.”

 

“I'm fine with that,” said Eliza through clenched teeth. Jeremiah's body had relaxed and by his breathing she ascertained that her husband was unconscious. Still too soon to be relieved. “Especially the part about you going first.”

 

Lillian stared straight over the barrel and into Eliza’s clear, fearless eyes. “Meanwhile, my husband learns of my demise, hunts your daughter like an animal and sets her free once she's served her purpose. In the years following, her colleagues and patients die in freak accidents, her girlfriend goes missing and on every Valentine's Day, Alexandra receives a piece of her in the mail. Someday, once she’s all alone, she learns that her dumb, dead mother had the option to spare her of her fate but chose to blow my brains out instead.”

 

With shaking breath and tears welling, Eliza rested her finger against the trigger. “Kara will protect her.”

 

Lillian flinched. “ _My_ _Kara_? Please.”

 

“She may be yours, but that's not all she is.” Eliza cocked her head, daring Lillian to argue. “Believe it or not, both of our girls will survive without us. They're stronger than you know.”

 

“Let’s hope not. If they're too strong, my husband will be inclined to dispose of them.”

 

Rage infused her voice when Eliza asked in a rasp, “You would have him “dispose” of Kara? Your own child?!”

 

“Priorities, Dr. Danvers. After all, it's a certainty that Lionel will destroy yours if you pull that trigger.” A noncommittal purse of her lips signalled that Lillian had calculated the odds on how their faceoff would conclude. “Put the gun down, if you don't mind. I didn't come here to fight. I only need a favor.”

 

Beleaguered by the overwhelming threat and admitting defeat with the caveat of her daughter's well-being in mind, Eliza dropped the gun to point between Lillian’s feet. The LuthorCorp henchmen didn't surge forward to apprehend her. “What is it that you want from us?”

 

“Why, Eliza, I appreciate you asking. Would you believe that my own children haven't been answering their phones and now yours has stopped taking my calls as well? Maybe it's because I didn't text it to her. You know how young people are with communication these days.” Lillian reached into her coat pocket and revealed Eliza Danvers’ cell phone, just as she had left it on the bureau at home, and passed it into her free hand.

 

Eliza smirked, unsurprised. “Too smart to get caught in your web, is she? You have to use us to try and bait Alex?”

 

“Would you mind giving her a quick ring for me?” suggested Lillian, ignoring her question. With the motion of one finger, her lackeys swapped out their weapons and trained actual handguns on Eliza and Jeremiah, flat on his back. “Let's hope you have better luck reaching her than I did, hm?"

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Geeesh, what a month and a half it's been. A lot has happened, and that's just on the show. With the canon timeline and the addition of bald(!) Lionel Luthor, this story is now unstoppably AU. And yet.. Well, you'll see. Anyway, thank you for reading and for your patience and I hope you're doing well. Please take care of yourselves, fam.


	11. Chapter 11

Hank Henshaw’s presence on Thorul Airbase rattled Luthor’s flunkies more than their own boss. Finding satisfaction in that was a petty indulgence, but he’d take it. The compound was aflutter over the first full assemblage of his new combat unit, and Henshaw allowed himself to wallow in a touch of hubris. Fellow soldiers saluted him as he passed and scientists nodded, unable to look him in the eye. A band of qualified nerds were still scavenging through the remains of the aliens he’d delivered two days ago. Except for the pieces in the max clearance alien chamber, golden calves that they were.

 

“Agent Henshaw, sir? Mr. Luthor requested I inform you that he's waiting in the command room over hangar six.” A squirrely little guy dressed in fatigues with eyes clear enough to be fresh out of training was at his elbow. The halls were bustling and Henshaw hadn't noticed that he was being tailed by Luthor’s gopher - he’d have to watch that. Being poised so close to fulfilling Cadmus’ mission could make him careless if he let it go to his head. He'd come too far to let his guard down now.

 

“Run along and tell him that I'll be there in a moment. I had to take a piss.” It was almost true. On his way down a hall with rest rooms, he had witnessed two prisoners arriving to be detained in holding cells. They were fairly unremarkable. A blonde female and dark haired male, both white and in their early fifties. Four mercenaries accompanied them on their foot march, guns drawn and ready to fire if either made a break for an exit. Overkill by his standards, given that the two of them were bedraggled, dazed and by his guess, civilians. The guns trained on them by their escorts didn't phase them, however. They were speaking quietly with one another as they passed him in the stark white hallway, lead and flanked by stone-faced paramilitary.

 

_“Lillian won't do anything to us until she hears from her,” said the man, eyeing Hank as suspiciously as Henshaw was him. “We’ve got time to figure this out ourselves and keep Alex out of it.”_

 

_The woman ignored Hank and replied tersely to her husband, “Promise me one thing. If we have to, we’ll remove ourselves from this hostage situation before Alex has to compromise herself for our sakes. No matter what it takes. Swear to me, Jeremiah.”_

 

_Henshaw raised an eyebrow at the conviction in the woman’s voice, and halted his advance to the control floor. Whoever this was, she had made up her mind to be a problem for the Luthors. He wouldn't call it an unlikeable quality. Jeremiah nodded and, pact made, took her hand and the two of them continued behind him in the opposite direction, armed entourage guiding them forward._

 

Ahead of him, the young soldier hustled just short of a jog, gait gangly and anxious with the awareness that Agent Henshaw was trailing him. They passed by a huddled band of LuthorCorp-employed geneticists seated in a small waiting area and Hank nodded to them. They blanched and a couple offered stilted salutes. By appearances, he would not have credited a group of meek, sickly-looking labcoats who seemed one loud noise away from scattering like roaches in the night as being absolutely integral to Project Cadmus. But his men had depended on these fine paragons of weird science to maintain their vitality in the face of Cadmus’ arduous work all of these years. They had kept his boys alive.

 

Not all of his comrades-in-arms had lived to see the fruition of the seeds they had died planting, unfortunately. Jim Harper, for one, deserved to be walking beside him in this victory lap around the facility. Hank would be true to his oath to never forget the sacrifices made in the name of Cadmus, and the survivors would earn retribution for the fallen.

 

Once he rid himself of the Luthors, that green abomination from the jungle would be the first thing he scratched off his list.

 

“Sir! Right through here, please!” said the soldier, squeaky and blinking profusely. He held his palm to the panel mounted on the wall and the broad steel door slid open.

 

Luthor awaited inside, his back to him and deep in thought, leaning forward on his elbows against the railing overlooking hangar six. The catwalk floor was plated metal, the room open to the air and suspended like balcony seating over the rest of the aircraft hangar, thirty feet below. He turned at Hank’s approach and a false smile spread across his face when he acknowledged him.

 

“Agent Henshaw! It's been too long. You’ve, ah, gone a tinge grey since I've seen you last.” Lionel squinted at him, lips pursed. “You should heed that warning sign for burnout. Can't have you retiring now that you've accomplished something.”

 

“A little grey never stopped you from getting things done, or at least I assume it wasn't the grey. Don't you worry, I've still got some years left in me. And I won't waste a single day sitting on my hands.” Before Lionel could return with another jibe, Hank redirected the conversation to a persistent weakness of his associate’s. “Speaking of, have you straightened out your kid yet? It’d be a damn shame if my men had to take down a superpowered Luthor gone rogue.”

 

The soldiers waiting below were nearly silent, lined in six rows of six, totalling thirty-six men in all. They wore black combat uniforms devoid of logos or indications of rank. What they were would speak for itself, when the time came.

 

Lionel studied them instead of replying, ignoring him in profile. For the first time, Hank noticed that his hair was unkempt, beard uneven and grizzled, suit wrinkled. Luthor looked like shit. Things were too down to the wire for the old buzzard to lose his nerve now.

 

Hank joined him on the railing, speaking quietly but plainly as they overlooked his men, a culmination of years of toil within their hellish partnership. “Out of professional courtesy, I'll say this one time, Mr. Luthor. You may not care if Lex gets a wild hair up his ass and pisses away his trust fund or his shot at the Whitehouse, but Cadmus is poised to actually change the world for the better. Trust that there will be consequences if Patient Zero lashes out because mommy and daddy never took parenting classes.”

 

“...Do you have children, Henshaw?” The customary sneer was absent from Lionel’s lips and Hank was taken aback at the idea that the man might truly be levelling with him after everything. “It occurs to me that I probably knew at one point and have since forgotten, and never cared to ask.”

 

“No, sir. Didn't want to drag anybody else into this uncertain universe that we call home. Not until I've done my part to ensure that our world has some stability - some security against what's beyond it.”

 

“Perfectly reasonable, Hank, and inarguably selfless. I, in contrast, have two children whom I imagine harbor dissimilar but equally as potent anxiety in the face of our, ah, “ _uncertain universe_.” And as I've made no efforts to provide them any modicum of existential reassurance _,_ this outcome was inevitable. My son has lost faith in me, and my daughter, well… if my daughter were aware of how little she needed me, I might be a different man.”

 

“You never talk about your daughter.”

 

“She's not a part of this. She doesn't know anything about Cadmus or our work, and I vainly hoped that it would never touch her. Believe it or not, that naïveté may be the only scrap of evidence to be found towards my human decency, Agent Henshaw.”

 

“Tell her,” he suggested immediately in his raspy bass, almost an order. Something had shifted in their dynamic even if temporarily, and Hank couldn't stop himself from imparting advice as if Luthor were a wet-behind-the-ears private with the jitters. “Tell her everything before the life she knows falls out from under her. The aliens, our project, your role in this - the world is now in flux and the war is here, Lionel. Lex may be a lost cause, but your daughter will need you just as much as any girl needs her dad in times of crisis.”

 

“Perhaps. Or, perhaps I may very well be the worst thing that ever happened to my daughter. And I have  _worthy_ competition, let me tell you.” Lionel tried to laugh but it caught in his throat and he turned his face from Hank as he waited for this onset of self-reflection to pass. “But in any case,” he said after a beat, and shifted his focus to the lower story, “you're here to show me what your recruits can do, not the error of my ways, yes?”

 

Henshaw let his face go blank. “Don’t underestimate my ability to multitask, Luthor.”

 

Lionel chuckled briefly but genuinely. “Fair enough, Agent.”

 

Henshaw stepped to the edge of the platform and cleared his throat. The soldiers below stood at attention, waiting in anticipation as though they had heard every word of his and Lionel's conversation. Which they had, of course. He spread his arms wide and raised them slowly, beckoning. “Meet the new defenders of the human race, Mr. Luthor. Project Cadmus - realized.”

 

Moving like a school of fish shifting as one through water, thirty-six men lifted off of the concrete floor and ascended in the air. Lionel gasped, even though he knew exactly what he had bankrolled all of these years. The old buffoon had used his own son as a guinea pig, and he had the gall to act surprised now? Hank’s lip curled at the muted awe across Luthor’s face when his men silently halted at eye level, still perfectly aligned, hands clasped at their backs.

 

“...Well done, Agent Henshaw.”

 

He didn’t waste time basking in Luthor’s momentary lapse of disdain. This was not a man whose opinion of him mattered. Lionel Luthor was a paper tiger when all was said and done. His son cavorting around unchecked with alien DNA proved that. “I’ve received intelligence reports that there was a leak somewhere down the pipeline and now we've got a five-star problem running his mouth off to the press.”

 

“Oh?” Luthor’s visage betrayed no playful awareness of whom Henshaw referred. He evidently wasn't privy to the info that Catco Media had their operation in its crosshairs. Over a decade of his life spent pacifying this feeble-minded, incompetent son of a drunken Scotsman and Henshaw still wondered at his own tolerance.

 

“We’re due to test combat readiness anyhow. Let’s kill two birds with one stone.” Hank directed his attention to his men hovering in place and asked, casually with a wave of his arm, “any of you boys ever been ground up underneath Sam Lane’s boot? Because you're going to love this next part.”

 

* * *

 

 

A second pigeon landed to rest by the first mottled brown bird pecking away at the smatter of breadcrumbs by Alex's feet. They had taken an interest in her as soon as she arrived at her designated park bench. The birds scuffled across the cement walking trail, dancing through their feast of the last shreds of whole wheat loaf she distractedly tossed before them. Six meters away and at ten o’clock was Maggie in a Monarchs ball cap to keep an eye on her, her yoga mat placed strategically within view on the wide green lawn of NatCity Field park. A news chopper veered into the distant, heavy grey sky and if Alex had enough damns left to give at this point, she might have lamented not bringing an umbrella.

 

To Alex’s right, half pinned down to the metal bench by the back of her thigh was a manilla envelope containing the results of Lex Luthor's bloodwork and the composition of his medication. It was only a stack of plain white paper and ink but the content lended her package a hum of menace that ran like a current through her leg.

 

The green lump of mineral Lex had brought with him, sealed in a lead box the size of a softball, bulged slightly from the side of her purse. All of these years and he still held on to that first piece of kryptonite that had revealed Kara's one true vulnerability. If he hadn't, there would have been no way to draw his blood in the backseat of Maggie's cruiser in the police parking garage. But there also wouldn't be the lingering suspicion that he had kept it in the event that he might someday use it against Kara.

 

_“It was only for sentimental value,” Lex had claimed yesterday, following her down the stairwell, shoulders hunched and face hidden by his scuffed sunglasses. “I would never have this around Kara; it’s been locked away in my old wall safe at my parents’ penthouse. I hadn't even looked at it in years.” His explanation was hurried while still maintaining a too-familiar flippancy - clearly rehearsed. “That's what tipped me off that something was wrong. I never used to have a tremor and get nauseated when I opened it. Not even back when I was sick.”_

 

_“Why keep it in the house? Wasn't there someplace safe that wouldn't make Kara feel like she lived with a guillotine hanging over her?” Lex Luthor had never been good for Alex’s blood pressure but the revelation that his mother had finally tipped over into openly threatening her like some sort of cartoon villain inexplicably softened Lex. To an extent. “I’m surprised your parents let you hold on to it. Would have thought they'd have had it made into rings and pendants just in case Kara rebelled against curfew.”_

 

_His mimicked footsteps cut off abruptly as he halted trailing behind her. “They didn't know I still had it.”_

 

 _“Why_ _did_ _you? And why didn’t they care where it was?”_

 

Lex hadn't given an answer, and they’d extracted his blood in silence and ended the collusion with a plan to meet the next day. It was a possibility that he didn't know the answers to those questions himself. Or just didn't want to face them.

 

When Alex was eighteen and about to leave home for the first time, she and Lex had a blowout over Kara and the wounds remained tender to this day. Spending time with Lex Luthor was taxing on her self-control and eventually self-respect if she allowed herself to sink to his level. He’d always had a talent for bringing out the worst in her and after years of simmering hurt and frustration between them, it was difficult to unpack on the fly. The man was exhausting.

 

Plus, she still half expected this whole thing to be an elaborate revenge plot of Lillian’s for being uncooperative, and she’d cast her son to play the fun-filled role of betrayer.

 

A figure wearing Lex’s hoodie from yesterday entered her line of sight, rounding a copse of flowering shrubs to approach from the far left of the trail. His face was too obscured by his hoodie to see him properly, but he kept his right hand in his pocket and with his left he held his ring and middle finger pressed beneath his thumb. The devil’s sign - their previously agreed upon signal that they were in the clear. Alex had been pressed for time and it was the first thing that came to mind. _“Rock on,”_ was Lex’s amused reply. Ugh. He still remembered her teenage mohawk.

 

She shifted her focus surreptitiously back to the pigeons until he sank into view and sat beside her.

 

“Nice day, huh?” Even idle small talk couldn't blunt the natural sarcasm in Lex’s voice. “What's that you're reading? Anything good?”

 

Alex held her face neutral and slipped him the envelope discreetly. The pigeons pecked about, behaving politely in their pigeon community breadcrumb line. She watched them, the following moments filled only with white noise of vehicles in the distance and the scratch of shifting paper as Lex read and re-read his medical file.

 

“So that's it. It's true. I'm Kryptonian.” Lex nodded repeatedly in short mechanical motions, his jaw clenched. “They fucking experimented on me. My own parents.”

 

She sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. As uncomfortable as her involvement in this entire ordeal was for her, she couldn’t imagine how she would feel in Lex’s shoes.

 

“And we can guess their reasoning. As messed up as it sounds, you tested positive for Kryptonian cells and you're most likely alive because of it.” The Luthors would experiment on their own son, sure. Of course they would. Alex wouldn’t say aloud that the more surprising revelation was that it might be out of love for him and not plain old sadism. “The disconcerting half of it is that those pills they had you prescribed were laced with microscopic traces of Kryptonite. LuthorCorp saved you and then they suppressed your Kryptonian abilities without you even knowing it all of these years.”

 

“I can hardly believe that they never let it slip. Manufactured superpowers? How did they stop themselves from bragging about it constantly?” He handed the envelope back to her, shaking his head with that same spark of desperation in his eyes and she wordlessly stashed it in her bag. “I must say, Alex; I feel like I don’t even know them anymore.”

 

Leave it to Lex to play off an horrific violation of trust and medical consent as a joke. Alex smiled thinly at his attempt to stifle his own feelings. God, the Luthors were so screwed up. Would Lex ever have the self awareness and willpower to overcome it, or was Kara the Luthor miracle child in more ways than one?

 

Lex’s head shot up suddenly, cocked to the side, listening for something behind them. “Did you throw away your phone like I told you to yesterday?”

 

 _Have I ever done anything you ordered me to do_ , she wanted to snap, but he had a point this time. Still, it was the last, best way to stay in contact with her parents and with Kara. “I turned it off and kept it that way. For all I know my mom and dad have left fifty messages from the beach in Maui, and Kara's there with them. Doubtful, but as long as I don't know what's happening, it's still a possibility.”

 

“Bad move either way, Alexandra. You most assuredly have my family’s people tracking you. Come on, you're not safe in National City any longer. We're going to go get Kara in Smallville.” Lex stood and offered her his hand. “Presenting a united front may be our only chance at stopping my family’s endgame.”

 

For the first time since she'd met Lex Luthor, she was knowingly of the same mind as him. Unsettling. He noticed her hesitation.

 

“All that I'm asking is you help me save the world, Alex. Not anything dangerous, like voting for me,” Lex added dryly, with a suppressed smile.

 

“Fine. Let me tell my—” Alex peered out over the lawn to give Maggie a tip of the hat motion and signal that they were wrapping up. But her surveillance point on the grass was empty aside from her abandoned yoga mat. Her Monarchs cap lay a few paces to the right of it, dirty and on its side in the grass. Maggie was gone. “ _Maggie?!_ ”

 

The pigeons scattered in a panicked explosion of wings into the sky as Lex yanked Alex bodily by the waist over and behind the park bench and two metallic ricochets collided against the front of it.

 

“Goddamnit! _Stay down!_ ” bellowed Lex. Alex, who was crouched and disoriented, turned in time to see Lex launch himself across the green. Like a mirage, he was there and gone and the sound of men crying out and cursing erupted from the trees in the surrounding area. The park-goers littering their vicinity noticed the upset with curiosity and then alarm when Maggie’s voice rang out.

 

“NCPD! You're under arrest!” To the far right of the trail, a hot dog vender halfway through retrieving a rifle from the water well of his cart slumped to the ground as the butt of Maggie's glock connected with his skull. “Alex, they're everywhere! We gotta go!”

 

Another shot rang out and a tiny dart lodged itself into the cement mere inches from Alex’s right hand. Lillian intended to take her alive. She'd almost prefer the alternative, given the depth of ruthlessness Alex had learned she possessed. Whatever Lillian's plans for her were, Alex wouldn't put it past her to try and one-up the fear of death itself as petty revenge against it for her own mortality. Kara’s mom was evil, but no one could accuse her of lacking ambition.

 

Screams of other park attendees pierced through the air as people ran for their lives from the crack of gunfire. Alex steadied herself and then took off in Maggie’s direction like a sprinter in a hundred-yard dash, not slowing even when Maggie pointed her gun and fired past her. A howl of pain broke out from far too closely behind Alex, but she arrived safely to Maggie's side. “Can we make it to your car?!”

 

The roar of engines thundered throughout the field clearing and a trio of dark Range Rovers burst through the foliage and tore up the grass, encircling their position. They halted in a triad, surrounding them. LuthorCorp’s logo gleamed menacingly from the backseat doors.

 

This gambit was Lillian Luthor past the point of letting public perception hold her to any humane standard of accountability. Alex recalled the solid timbre of her mother’s voice when she had rejected Lillian’s proposal all of those years ago and then shook off the fear edging in to paralyze her. The Luthors had never intimidated the Danvers into surrender before and they weren't about to start with her.

 

Grabbing Maggie’s arm, they bolted for the opening between the two vehicles blocking their getaway to where Maggie's cruiser was parked on the street. As they approached the passage between grill and rear bumper, what looked to be an entire wetworks team of LuthorCorp personnel started to unload from the two nearest SUVs. The third, in an impressive arc of screeching metal and the screeching paramilitary inside, soared from behind and end-over-end above Alex and Maggie’s heads. It crashed upside down and caved in the roof of the SUV to their left, bowling over its passengers. The leader of the pack on the right got as far as lifting his dart gun before he was flung off his feet and landed like a ragdoll in a nearby tree, unconscious.

 

In a blur, Lex stepped in front of Alex and shoved the closest goon charging at her backwards. The attacker slammed into the rest of his comrades, knocking all of them and their guns to the turf like a line of killer dominos.

 

“Keep moving! As much as it pains me, we haven't got time for me to show off!” Lex spun around impossibly fast to glare over their heads. Maggie reflexively tightened her grip on Alex's arm, eyes wide and mouth forming the beginnings of a dozen questions, but a fourth SUV barreled towards them, unheeding of the fate of those before it. “Well, maybe a little time.”

 

“We should go! They're after Alex!” Maggie went unheard by Lex, who slipped past them to stand between them and the LuthorCorp squad approaching from behind. She half dragged Alex through the vehicle wreckage in the direction of her car, which seemed far too distant now. “What in the hell is happening?”

 

Behind them, the SUV skidded sharply to a halt before Lex, kicking up dirt at him. His hood was pulled back, low profile disguise gone by the wayside. He greeted the vehicle with crossed arms and radiated the cocksure self assurance more typical of the Lex that Alex knew. And against a platoon of LuthorCorp muscle, she actually welcomed that aggravating overconfidence for once.

 

Alex struggled to keep pace with Maggie even though keeping their heads down meant they couldn't move as fast as they'd like. Part of her didn’t want to risk leaving Kara's brother behind. Damnit. “I will tell you everything, but for now we need to reach Smallville, Kansas as quickly as possible.” If she had the time she would hold Maggie's face in her hands and tell her all of it; she would spend the rest of her life letting Maggie know how important she was even if the world spun into chaos.

 

But all Alex had was right now - out of breath, legs burning, and unbearable mental flashes of what could happen if the pressure of Maggie's fingers around her forearm suddenly fell away. “Honey, I promise you, I will explain. But please, on the way there!”

 

The door to the Range Rover popped open and a voice as crisp as a winter morning resounded across the deserted park and dropped Alex’s heart to her feet. “Lex, dear, you're blocking traffic.”

 

“How could you do this, mom? You used me. You used Kara!” A harsh, metallic crunch and angry hissing hinted that Lex had used a fist to put a modern twist on his youthful tradition of blowing out the engines of his parents’ cars. “That's enough. You've done enough. Leave the Danvers out of it.”

 

“You're barely scratching the surface of the sacrifice it's taken to get us here. As you're well aware. Or have you forgotten about exactly who’s in that special room at the airbase? Who do you think you should be thanking for your life?” Lillian chuckled, the stack of SUVs obscuring her from Alex's vision at a glance, but her ridicule of Lex was loud and clear. “If you're going to bring your sister into this, then remember that your hands aren't any cleaner than mine.”

 

Alex hesitated, straining against Maggie's insistent pull away from the Luthors. But the airbase Lillian referred to had to be the same one where Kara had stayed her first few nights on Earth. Did Lillian have her locked away? Had they experimented on her? Could they bury Kara, their own family, in a grave of kryptonite just like that horrible footage on the news?

 

“I  _knew_ it,” Lex replied to his mother, subdued. “Believe me - if I could trade him places, I would.”

 

“Wait, what?” Alex braced her heels against a batch of roots and ground to a full stop listening to the Luthors’ confrontation.

 

Maggie gave up trying to move her and instead trained her gun on the handful of armed men approaching through the trees from the direction of their planned escape. They were equipped with rifles and body armor, and spread out to fence the two of them in until they were backed up the way they'd come, pushed towards Lillian and Lex. Judging by the way the LuthorCorp goon squad patiently herded them and hadn't shot Maggie and her full of holes yet, Alex guessed they were on orders to subdue, not kill. Maggie cursed under her breath, laying their odds.

 

“If you aren't careful, Lex, you could have more in common with him than any of us prefer,” said Lillian, her form clearer now that Alex had lost ground. From the corner of her eye, she caught Lillian reaching into the breast pocket of her long grey jacket. Before her, Lex dropped to one knee, revealing his mother wielding something green and glinting that wrapped around her hand like brass knuckles. “I’m sorry you made it come to this, Lex.”

 

He groaned as he swayed on his knees in the dirt, the set of his shoulders lax and defeated. “You’d play me too, mom? Like I’m some no-name rube? Am I just an organ donor to you now?”

 

“I didn’t “play” you. You played yourself, dear. You never could resist being baited by Alexandra. So I worked with what you gave me. Don't worry. We'll get this sorted out. Everything is going to be alright.”

 

Lillian swung once, briskly, with the revulsion of someone swinging a fly swatter at an insect. The crack of her fist against her son’s jaw echoed across the park and Lex slumped backwards without a word, limbs akimbo. She immediately returned the kryptonite weapon to her pocket, then cupped her hands around her mouth.

 

“I know that you're still here, Alexandra.” Even barely above speaking volume, the woman’s voice carried without losing an ounce of serene menace. “I'm here to make you a deal. Come willingly, and I let Eliza and Jeremiah know that you're alive and well. Refuse, and they die tonight believing that their daughter will greet them in the afterlife.”

 

“We’ve got her and the officer covered, ma’am. We can begin extraction on your order,” the commander of the LuthorCorp crew announced, and pointedly cocked his head at Maggie from behind his rifle.

 

Maggie, gun at the ready and poised to go out in a blaze of glory if the LuthorCorp cronies marched any closer, bumped Alex’s shoulder. “Alex, don't do this. You don't know if she's telling the truth. You don't know what she'll do to you.”

 

“I know what she'll do to my parents. And to you.” Alex took a breath, turned her back on the gunmen and stepped into Lillian’s line of sight between the destroyed vehicles to address her directly. “What do you want from me, Lillian? Don't tell me you went through all the trouble of stalking and blackmailing me just to have an edge against Kara.”

 

With a look of appraisal at Alex’s boldness, Lillian took her time answering. She dusted off her hands, stuck them in her waist pockets and ambled up casually like an old friend taking her for coffee. “Alexandra,” she began chidingly. “This has never been about Kara. Your mind is special, your skills are unique, and I aim to capitalize on it. Consider this a business proposal.”

 

Caught between an anvil and the hammer, there was no more running from Lillian. She had felt unexplainably hunted by Mrs. Luthor for years and here it was, the unequivocal answer to the question of why Lillian could never seem to leave her alone. Alex Danvers was a critical moving part in her clockwork master plan. If she could go back and warn herself, her past incarnation probably wouldn't even be surprised. What could she have done differently that wouldn't have only served to catch her in Lillian’s web even sooner? Maybe all roads lead to this decision eventually.

 

“Fine.” Alex noticed the twitch of surprise around Lillian's eyes with muted satisfaction. “As long as my parents are unharmed and my girlfriend can go free, I'll come with you.”

 

“Hm. Does she promise not to make herself a nuisance for me?” Maggie, still facing off against the commander behind her, appeared at Alex’s shoulder.

 

“Lady, you call off your dogs and I'll think about it—”

 

Before Maggie had finished her sentence, Lillian pointed a finger at her. “Shoot the detective.”

 

Alex didn't have time to scream, to even react before Maggie gasped and swooned against her, unconscious. She caught her in her arms and lowered her as gently as she could to the ground. In Maggie's throat was a tiny dart that Alex plucked out and furiously pelted over her shoulder.

 

“You didn't have to do that! I agreed to your terms!”

 

“And I agree to yours. She'll be fine. Trust me - when I say something is going to happen, it happens. I am a woman of monumental integrity, Alexandra.”

 

Lillian's shadow blocked the sliver of sun in the grey as she towered over them. Nearby, Lex’s body remained inert, his eyes closed and an ugly welt forming on the side of his head. Cradling Maggie to her, Alex only heard the clicking of a gun before her vision blurred and Maggie's face was lost in the darkness.

 

As if from underwater and a great distance, Lillian’s voice, with seething resentment finally boiling over, snapped, “But you would know that if you hadn't been such a judgmental little shit all these years, wouldn't you?”

 

 

* * *

 

 

“Still not picking up?” asked Lena, her voice echoing from beneath the BMW resting above her on jacks. Her torso and legs protruded from under the car and her back was supported by a wooden plank on wheels. For the project, Lena wore blue jeans and a grey T-shirt that had both seen better days and were streaked with fresh oil.

 

Kara walked over to the plastic mat covering her workshop floor and sat crossed-legged bedside Lena’s feet. Such a farmgirl, with her pant legs tucked into old boots, mud and hay caked in the tread. The barn doors were thrown wide open for ventilation, with the scent of hay wafting in the air. Outside, an horizon murky with charcoal clouds blotting out the sun and battered with biting wind was a world away from the lived-in coziness of the barn. Martha was off tending plants in the greenhouse, the quiet busywork drowning out the quiet dread.

 

Kara could empathize, after her years of late night impulse paperwork during her time with LuthorCorp. Odd to know that she would never experience those familiar routines again. The escapist aspect of her job lacked the appeal it once held back when she needed the shifting scenery to avoid the anguish in her heart. She’d discovered a new kind of anxiety on Kent Farm, and a new kind of peace.

 

Not wanting to alarm her, Kara patted Lena’s ankle to let her know where she was. “I left a message. I think her phone may be dead. With everything happening, I’m trying not to imagine the worst.”

 

“Do you think you can get to her if things went bad? Fly to her?” Lena’s voice reverberated through the metal parts from beneath the belly of her car.

 

“If I knew where she was. Even then, I would have to be careful. It could end up making things worse.” Forgetting her phone could wind up striking the fatal blow to her whole plan to take on her family if she couldn't be sure her friends were safe when the fireworks began. But Kara couldn't take to the skies and hope that she came across Alex with her enhanced sight like she was playing high-stakes _Where's Waldo._

 

“It would be funny,” continued Kara, “to imagine the headline. _Uncomfortable witnesses spot flying woman in heated public argument with her mother._ ”

 

“Your hypothetical witnesses sound cynical. You know at least a few in the crowd would forget themselves; plead for you to abduct them on the spot.”

 

Lena’s words were light and teasing but Kara saw the frustration and concern across her face when she peered through the wounded guts of her vehicle. She’d told Lena all about Alex last night and the lack of communication when bloodshed was poised to break out with Kara at the epicenter could only place the Danvers danger-adjacent. “I wish I could swoop in and pull people out of this mess, no questions asked. Relocate everybody in Smallville onto your own private island. You think?”

 

“And carry… all of… those people in your arms?” breathed Lena, twisting interconnected parts with a long metal tool that Kara couldn't identify offhand. “What if I went mad with envy? We get there and I start rage-chucking coconuts into the sea?’”

 

On Krypton, she’d understood technology far beyond Earth’s capabilities, but that didn't mean Kara had spent her days studying obsolete travel machinery. The _Science_ Guild had accepted her, not the _nerd_ guild. So there was no shame in allowing Lena to figure it out, expertly examining the vehicle piece by piece, her fingers working delicately and with precision. Kara figured there was little harm in finding it pretty hot, if she thought about it hard enough, but this wasn't the time for entertaining those sorts of thoughts.

 

Not with Alex missing in action.

 

“Besides,” added Lena, somberly, “they're still stubborn Smallville residents and to them, you'd still be a Luthor. The average townie wouldn't accept your help, Kara. Not unless they knew without a doubt that you were different.”

 

“Do you think they know who I am? There's no family resemblance to give me away.”

 

“Small blessing, that. Your mother frightens me, if I'm honest.” Lena laid down her tools and began to slide herself out from under the car, using her heels to navigate. “But they'll cotton on eventually. The city board knows that LuthorCorp wants the farm and you left an impression that had them wondering downtown. I suspect Lana had you figured out instantly.”

 

“Talented lady. Master flower interpreter and Luthor identifier.” The memory of Lena’s meeting with Lana Lang in the back of the flower shop resurfaced with a pang of jealousy. Kara willed it to take five - Lena was allowed to have pretty friends, and who the heck was she to have an opinion about it anyway? So, yeah, she and Lena kissed. But what if she was the tiny diamond thinking it outshone the Jewel Mountains, as aunt Astra used to say of narcissists back on Krypton. Instead of verbalizing any of her miniature breakdown, Kara giggled awkwardly. “She seems nice.”

 

Besides, again, she had bigger problems, like Alex’s status and the warpath leading to Smallville... Not that Lana Lang was a problem. Kara closed her eyes, hard, and shook her head. The thing nobody said about freeing yourself from metaphorical chains was that at first it felt like cutting your roots. Her ability to focus had been knocked right off its feet, struggling to adapt to a non-Luthor-centered framework.

 

And Lena was a major factor. She was watching Kara silently, lying on her back beside her when Kara opened her eyes. There was a streak of oil smudged across her nose, and Kara was embarrassed with how attractive she found it. But the set of Lena’s dark brows indicated that she had an inkling of Kara’s unrest. “You okay?” she asked, sliding her board further forward until Kara’s face hovered above hers. “Looked like you were — were going on a little journey there.”

 

“I’m worried. About everything. Even stupid things.”

 

“Your worries can't be that stupid if they want to spend so much time with you, Kara.”

 

Kara smiled and watched Lena’s eyes light up below her. “Where do you come up with this stuff?”

 

“Could be that I feel obligated to keep you entertained since you're without your phone.” Lena poked one oil-free finger lightly into Kara’s knee. “But besides that, you inspire me to say what I feel, Kara. I've never met anyone like you. It’s made me think.”

 

Loose strands of Lena’s dark hair veiled her face, and Kara brushed them aside. She didn't expect for Lena's expression to waver, for her to clench her jaw and shunt her gaze. As if she'd needed something to hide behind. “What’s the matter?”

 

“There's something I want to tell you. But it's complicated. And I…” Lena reached for Kara's hand and threaded their fingers slowly, languorously, then followed the length of Kara’s forearm with her eyes, and peered up at her face with searing contemplation. “Kara, you're the first person to ever make me consider a change of plan.”

 

“What plan?”

 

“Question of the day, Ms. Luthor.” Kara jumped away from Lena when Clark came stomping into the barn. In his hand was a glossy magazine bearing the CatCo logo and a professional photo of her parents with metal bars superimposed over them. “We’re going to need a concrete one if we want to make it through this.”

 

“They already published it?!” She hadn’t heard him at all. No warning, no heartbeat, no footsteps. Like he just materialized right there in his coveralls. It was eerie. And a little annoying. Lena was about to confide in her and she was disappointed at the interruption. “What’s it say?” Below her, Lena began to clamber off of the mechanic’s skateboard to join the tall people.

 

Without thinking, Kara reached down and helped Lena with a gentle tug, effortlessly lifting her up and off her feet to land lightly beside her. Then she froze, remembering herself and that Clark was right there, but he only squinted at her and blinked.

 

“Lena, how about you go on inside and get cleaned up. If you don't mind, I'd like to have a word with Ms. Luthor.”

 

“Right _now?_ What is in that article?” Lena, ignoring his suggestion, grabbed the magazine from him and flipped through it, poring over the pages with the intensity of a grieving relative reading a last will and testament. “Oh. _Oh_. We’re in this by name. They really told the whole story about dad.”

 

“Yes. It’s everything they told you it would be, and worse. There’s already commotion downtown about it. People are worried, scared. They’re taking sides and we need to get ahead of this.” Clark fixed Kara with a troubled, probing stare, and then tentatively reached up and removed his glasses. “And even moreso, Ms. Luthor, we need to speak about the plant.”

 

His eyes, brown a moment before, glowed bright red with unnatural luminescence.

 

“Uh… what?” Kara unthinkingly took a step that placed her between Lena and Clark. There was being off and being _off_ , and it turned out Clark Kent was something altogether unexpected. What the hell? What the _hell?_

 

Lena rubbed Kara's shoulder reassuringly and sidled up to her, unbothered by her cousin’s otherworldly eyes. Some of the tenseness drained away, and Lena’s soft tone soothed her. “You two talk. I’ll get this gunk off of me and let mom know about this,” she said, shaking the magazine. “And after, there's something I need to show you. Okay, Kara?”

 

“You sure she's ready for all this?” Clark asked Lena, his attention still on Kara, who returned his look uncertainly.

 

“I don't understand. What's going on?”

 

“What's happening is, I trust you and that means that Clark does too. So, would you like to do the honor of introducing yourself properly...?” Lena trailed off, indicating for Clark to help Kara out.

 

“Of course. Ms. Luthor. My name,” began Clark, making Kara question her sanity as his form stretched high and wide, and his clothing and skin darkened into a rich green, “is J’onn J'onzz of Mars. In the last few hundred years that I've taken refuge here, Earth has become my second home. And if we don't destroy the refinery, you nor anyone else may ever feel safe here again.”

 

She turned to Lena, speechless, who raised her eyebrows innocently and shrugged in return. “Did I not say that you two had a lot in common?”

 

When Kara surveyed his face, what once was a mask of bland politeness, now expressed a severity that magnified his imperious and dignified new form. She had been right about him. He was different. Broad and imposing, clothing cut in an unfamiliar style, the man was an alien from outer space who found his way to Earth. Cousin Clark, the aw shucks interplanetary immigrant who embraced a life here with the Kents. She almost laughed at the irony.

 

“I’ll be damned.” Trying again, Kara extended a hand. “Sorry. It’s nice to meet you, J’onn J'onzz. Kara Zor-El.”

 

J’onn, with the self-conscious unease of someone trying something new, reached out a green arm and returned her handshake. “Ah, nice to meet you, as well, Ms. Zor-El.”

 

Lena, hiding her grin behind the spine of the magazine, stifled a chuckle at their expense. “You two are _so_ _awkward_. It’s adorable, really.”

 

“Did you tell him?” asked Kara.

 

“Go take a shower, gearhead,” said J’onn at the same time.

 

“No, I did not tell him. I would never do that. He's just extremely nosey,” explained Lena in exasperation, then turned to J’onn. “You'd better watch out for her, if you're doing what I think you're doing.”

 

“What are we doing?” Kara was rolling with whatever came next, in a numbed sort of wonder. She tried not to stare. A _cape_ , though? “I feel like I'm going to be asking you questions for the next ten years,” she mumbled.

 

“We're going to - and I am not _nosey_ , Lena, don't tell her that - we’re going to rally Smallville against your family. You don't have to tell them who you are, but I could use the muscle if things get rowdy. I sneaked into the plant again earlier. They’ve upgraded over the last few months. Assembly lines in the lower levels, metal frames for construction. I don't like the looks of it.”

 

“You're afraid,” murmured Lena.

 

J’onn didn't disagree.

 

“Afraid of what?” Glancing between them, Kara could sense that she was missing key information, but at this point, she would be disappointed if she had learned all that she was going to about the Kent family. “What do you think they're building?”

 

“It isn't only a fraudulent refinery anymore. From what I saw, they're building more than simple weapons; more than body armor or guns with that meteor rock. I think they're preparing to manufacture robotics. Robotics that can be piloted internally by a human body.” J’onn took a breath, and his stern features melted into a nakedly compassionate visage. When he was sad, J’onn J’onzz possessed the melancholic beauty that a long dead artist might have sculpted from marble. Kara could hardly believe that this was the same person she'd met hawking tomatoes.

 

“It's all right, J'onn. Just say what you need to say,” urged Lena. Her expression mirrored his own and she captured one of his massive green hands between hers and grasped it consolingly. “We'll deal with it together.’

 

Renewed apprehension crept into Kara's heart with the understanding that his sympathy was for her, over what he'd found in the hidden shadows of the refinery. “Do you have an idea what the robots are for? What they do?”

  
“I didn't come across any design plans on-site, but I believe that the Luthors are preparing for war.” He hung his head and averted his eyes away from her. “And they're going to wage it armed in suits custom-made to kill Kryptonians.”

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it's been a while and a lot's happened! Funny thing, I've been planning on saying that for a while and more and more just keeps on happening with the Arrowverse... I just want to thank everyone who's stuck it out with me. And if you're new to this story, welcome! This was an extra long chapter to make up for the hiatus, so let me know what you think, take care of yourselves, and hang in there, everybody.


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